Good Morning Saigon! Or Binghamton ‘ or London. You’ll have to forgive me, I’m having trouble remembering where I am these days.

Across the Pond and five hours ahead of the suckers pulling Eastern Time, life on a University-sanctioned mini-wanderjahr is, as one might believe, decidedly different.

And yet, notwithstanding the lack of prudent American euphemism, (the phrase ‘restroom’ is lovingly sacrificed for the more direct, and in my opinion more refreshing, ‘toilet box’) a healthy disregard for censorship and rarely having to produce ID before consumption, life is arguably familiar.

There are still commercials for the Army in between spots for Coca-Cola and Audis. Although to their credit, the Brit’s brand mulls their military arm as a patriotic gym membership.

Of the five channels we do receive on our government-licensed entertainment cube, the softened milky agitprop of the BBC reigns supreme. Anything else is a showcase of imported American programming, albeit with an invariably slanted view of Americana ‘ not the least of which includes Billy Bob Thornton, Ernest movies and The OC.

No wonder the world hates us.

Twenty-first century fear is alive and well in the Queen’s England: Road signs and bus posters remind tourists and citizens alike that terrorism ‘doesn’t take a holiday,’ and you won’t find a rubbish bin in most theatres ‘ policy remnants of IRA terrorist bombings still in effect for anyone who might feel like refreshing the idea.

Not too far off from the winsome edifices and metropolitan idyll of London central is that cacophony of youthful disillusionment with the state of things, both foreign and domestic. The English despise their Tony Blair almost as much as Yanks want to hang, draw and quarter Georgie ‘ almost (a favourite T-shirt of mine found while meandering the stalls of Camden Town’s open-air markets featured a bust of Dubya juxtaposed with the visage of Adolph Hitler, the caption ‘Same Shite’ floating happily underneath). All the same, Blair’s exit here is nigh ‘ a day that is seemingly being waited for with all the bated breath that an Occidental coming of the Messiah could afford.

Superficially, accents and vocabulary bombard the mind, but the British zeitgeist runs deeper than a few fancy turns of phrase and remembering to subtract five hours when calling New York. Immersed in ideology and opinion that clashes with any and all that I have known, I am welcomed to the preconceived notions this culture possesses of my own, at times more loudly than others.

Like it or not, I walk as a standard of American aggression and self-righteousness. I find myself both consciously and unconsciously defining, reaffirming and shattering stereotypes. Slipping in and out of the guise of tourist and Anglophile is becoming easier, if not more comfortable. Absorbing the caustic glares of Londoners every time I open my mouth is becoming more natural, realizing the innumerability of their experience more commonplace and accepting that it will take that much more time to understand it more reasonable.

And if I’ve got anything, it’s time. After all, I’m living in the future.

‘ Max Lakin is a junior English major studying in England. Despite what you or he may have been told, the English themselves do not find this amusing.