Globally Rational

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I’ve been asked questions like “where are you from?” many times. Every time, it’s clear to me that the inquisitor wants to know what country I was born in. I refuse to succumb; it’s not that I have any lack of respect for my background, but I just don’t understand why the person has to assume that I was born abroad. Usually, I respond with a simple “Here” if I’m in St. Louis at the time, “St. Louis” if I’m somewhere near St. Louis, or “Missouri” if I’m far away somewhere. The person is usually disappointed with the answer (since they just wanted to know whether to treat me like a terrorist or a tech support rep), so I’ll typically elaborate with “I was born in Pakistan” just for good measure.

Occasionally, the person probes deeper, as was the case today. I was asking for directions at the one of the Smithsonian museums in Washington DC, and the information representative asked me where I was from. This was one of the cases where I was happy to respond with “Missouri”, since she had only asked in response to my statement “there are no Ethiopian restaurants where I come from”. I really did mean Missouri when I said that, but she made sure to elaborate, “Where are you from originally?”

Personally, I have no qualms about saying that I’m from Pakistan, since I am, in fact, from Pakistan. On the other hand, I remember being in the car when a friend (whose parents happen to be Indian) was pulled over for speeding… when the officer asked him where he was from, he replied “India”. In fact, he has been to India two or three times in his life, and doesn’t even fluently speak any Indian languages. He was born and raised in Missouri, and he’s not the only such person who I have seen asked this question. Why do people assume that if you have brown skin, then you must be foreign? These few people are far more American than I am, and the issue bothers me a little bit… so I’m sure that they have to second-guess their answer too.

More than one out of every ten US residents was born in another country. Many of them are still white, so nobody ever asks them where they’re from. In my opinion, the only thing that justifies a question like “what country are you from?” is a person’s accent… my accent is as neutral and Midwestern as Dan Rather’s, so why do people automatically assume that I’m foreign?

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For the past year, my driving record has been clean and my insurance rates are about to go down. So you can imagine how I felt when a police officer lowered his window and tried to get my attention at a red light today. I didn’t know if one of my tail lights was our or if the cop just saw me take my eyes off the road when I made a phone call, but the last thing I wanted was another ticket to add to my less-than-spectacular record.

I rolled down my window and got my answer. “Where did you get those rims?”
I exhaled. “I bought them online… they’re called TSW Kyalami.”
“Oh OK… they’d look good on my A6; how big are they?”
“19 inches. I’m actually selling them soon… do you want my number?”

We pulled into a parking lot and exchanged information. It was all pretty straightforward; he said he’d talk to his wife and get back to me (which he probably won’t). But it got me thinking: why do we always have to be so worried about law enforcement?

Of all the cities I’ve visited, the traffic law is most efficient in Kuwait. They have cameras and radar sensors on the streets, so people are afraid to drive too fast. Also, all cars in Kuwait make an annoying beeping noise at 120 km/hr (75 mph, the speed limit on the highway). There is a lot of reckless driving, but nobody does anything that would warrant law enforcement action.

In Pakistan, on the other hand, you can do anything you want on the road without much fear of consequences. If you do get pulled over, you can pay off the cop easily. On the other hand, if they don’t like you for some reason, you can expect to be beaten unless you want to pay them well. But people still don’t worry when they see cops, since they know that the law is irrelevant… the cops won’t bother you unless you’re getting in their way.

We have a balance between the two systems here. But Kuwait has no crime (probably because their law enforcement can focus on real crime instead of trying to make money by giving tickets) and Pakistan has astronomical crime… we also have a balance between those two results. Maybe we could stand to learn something from the countries that are doing it right. We can’t implement the exact same system (Kuwait is much smaller than the US… although we might be able to do it state-by-state), but it might be helpful to spend some money on radar technology next year instead of signing another contract with Ford for a bunch of new Crown Victorias.

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