Mehrdad, I feel bad when I pass on A2As from you that I can’t answer. I can’t answer this either, but let’s analyse this. Why was the EU formed? Really, for political reasons: with the hope that a closer financial, and then political union between France and Germany would prevent World War III. That agenda […]
Is it really that bad to bring your daughter when talking to foreign diplomats and people of power? Why stop there? Why not bring the in-laws? And your cousin Vinny, who just loves sushi? Is it really that good to bring your daughter along? What are her qualifications for being there? What is the reason […]
Not… feeling it with these answers. Not putting themselves enough in the homophobe’s shoes, I believe. I think Sophia de Tricht’s is the closest to the answer I’m about to offer, but her answer was pretty epigrammatic. Consider this: Habib Fanny’s answer to Why do social conservatives care if gay people can marry or trans […]
First, thanks to Victoria Weaver for her assembled works of Glass, which I will be working through. Now, if I were a horrible human being, I would answer this question with something like this: MAHLER!!! Because he’s technically 20th century!!! In your FACE, Victoria! WAKEY-WAKEY!!! Ahem. But I am not a horrible human being. And […]
Um… positivity? … You’ve A2A’d the right guy, Diane? OK. I’m a misery guts, but I appreciate the challenge! It was my honeymoon, last year. For her sins, I dragged my honey to my home town in Greece. I wanted her to know where I grew up. I hadn’t been back in six years; and […]
This has been mentioned several times elsewhere here, and it’s not just Australian, it’s a British inheritance. Though I think we here have ramped it up to eleven. And it certainly disconcerts visitors. Hell, it’s disconcerted me. If Australians like you, they will make merciless fun of you. If they’re being civil to you, that’s […]
What you’re after is a country with an exaggeratedly strong nationalism, to the point of chauvinism, but not spilling over into racism. So you want a maxed out civic nationalism. France invented civic nationalism, but they asssimilated all their indigenous minorities aggressively, and they’ve botched their assimilation of the Beurs, so that’s not a good […]
Melbourne isn’t Sydney, with its really obvious, beautiful sights. It doesn’t really have any obvious, landmark attractions. It’s more atmosphere and aggregate of experience. In the CBD: walk around the alleyways for the funky graffiti and nouveau restaurants. Stare up, and admire the Victorian and Art Deco goodness of a confident, rich city. Walk down […]
Vote #1 Emre Sermutlu’s answer. Because I’m just some random Greek. Emre Sermutlu’s answer to Why hasn’t Turkey adopted federalism if it is big enough and divided into seven regions? Turkish Quorans may know me as an interested neighbour (Greek). Being Greek, the para about Turks being forced on the defensive in Emre’s answer is […]
Inexplicably, OP, you’ve A2A’d me. I played in school orchestra, and gave that up for university. I did have my dreams crushed later, with academia. And for all that it’s the worst thing to have happened in my life, I would not take it back. It’s made me who I am. So I don’t know […]