By the way... I don't want to sound as if I'm anti-American. I'm definitely not in line with the current government. However, I think there is much good that can be said about my country's people. Yes, they may be a bit naive about the world, and a bit gullible about the propaganda they are fed, but I think some of that derives from two things.
First, we are a large country that covers much of North America which, of course, we share with our neighbors Mexico and Canada. Other than those neighbors, there are no other countries which share borders with us. Therefore we are not used to a true international experience like those in Europe and Asia have.
Second, we tend to be fairly trusting (although at least we are starting to doubt what we have been told the past 7 years). That trust... or at least the desire to believe in what others say... is admirable even though it often leads to being very uninformed as well.
I've also noticed that many do not have much of an urge to travel. Of course some of this is due to the limited international experience of most Americans. Many who travel do so as tourists... using the same chain hotels decorated in the same way as they would use in the States. Not as many are true travelers, enjoying other countries by backpacking and spending time with the residents of each region they visit. Europeans are certainly much better in this regard. I don't have enough experience to generalize about Asians. However, it is pretty obvious from the members of this board that those here are often well traveled.
Our limited 10-day vacations do not give much opportunity for remote travel since some of those days are occupied with family visits involving travel since many of our families are dispersed (mine are in three states, all in the eastern part of the States).
However, there are enough of us who really wish to have more experience with the rest of the world (at least those regions where diving is good!). Who do not expect everyone to know English... as long as they are tolerant of our awkward attempts to speak local tongues. Who will agree that our government needs to be changed, but bristle when our countrymen (and women) are all lumped together in criticism.
Americans have done much good in the world. At least at certain times in our history we had a far more altruistic sense of what was in "our" national interest. Unfortunately over the past decades we, or at least our government, seems intent on pursuing our "manifest destiny" (how that disgusts me both now and in our past with respect to the Native Americans, Spanish, Mexicans, French, etc. who resided in what is now our land before we even landed here) and becoming the only Super Power, the next Empire (in a chain that began long before us and will continue, with new leaders, long after us). I like to think that most Americans do not want to be part of an Empire, despite what some of our leaders seem to think.
