I was heading back to campus after a very brief reprieve from my normal, hellish Monday routine yesterday around 2:30 when I heard the absolutely coolest thing on KERA, Dallas’s local NPR station. It was a story from the PRI program The World about a hotel in Romania that was built as a replica of JR’s Southfork Ranch on the TV show “Dallas.” Apparently, the Romanian TV stations ran episodes of “Dallas” during Communist rule to show how terribly democracy and freedom worked in the evil American empire. However, it didn’t exactly have that impact on everyone who saw “Dallas,” and in the story, in fact, one Romanian suggests that “Dallas” brought democracy to Romania.
That’s a bit of a stretch, but this story not only fascinates and delights me, but also really makes me think about (of course) how something like that statement could be empirically tested/verified/nullified. But that’s just ’cause I’m in SERIOUS paper-writin’ mode right now, so I tend to think of almost everything in terms of operationalization, testable hypotheses, etc. Because that’s what political scientists do.
Anyway, you have to have a REALLY updated version of Windows Media Player to listen (sorry, Matt), but here’s a link if you want to listen to the story. (I also found this on a “Dallas” fan site, I guess?)
I have no idea if I'm the Matt you were trying to drag out of the woodwork by linking to heinous Microsoft propoganda… but my Mac handled that file just fine, thank you 🙂
I was in Turkey many years ago (about 7, actually), negotiating for a piece of jewelry when the store owner finally managed to choke out in some of the most strained English ever, "From? You? From?" To which I helpfully responded, "Dallas, Texas."
His face lit up, he smiled a huge smile, and said to his co-worker, clear as day, while slapping me on the back, "Jay Arr Ewink!"
Yes, I laughed, as I tried to explain that I lived a few miles from Southfork. Strangely, his problems with English disappeared as he proceeded to ask me if I rode a horse, and had an oilwell in my back yard. Trust me, I was there… he was as serious as a heart attack. I spent only about two or three minutes trying to explain that my town was not that different from his… he was so disappointed looking that I confessed I was just kidding and really did have an oil well.
/sigh
I probably set international relations back 10 years in that corner of Turkey.
Matt