Even if it's not the land of opportunity it once was, the Big
Mobility Scooter still has a lot going for it.
In fact, there are
at least 10 things by our count that you can't find as good anywhere else on
earth.
With the caveat
that China is on a trajectory to take over at least six of these categories by
2016, we present them without further interruption.
Except for this
last interruption (interrupting also being something Americans are fantastic
at): Be sure to express your wholesale agreement with our list in the comments.
1. Effusive greetings
"Ahoy!"
"Aloha!" "Hey!" "Hola!" "Howdy!"
"Hiya!" "Ho there!" "Well, look who it is!"
"What's happenin'?!" "'Sup!" "Yo!"
"Hello!"
The variety and
vibrancy of the American greeting is unrivaled, upholding a threshold of
friendliness that Americans demand, Europeans find onerous and others find
perplexing.
Want to slip
through somewhere un-greeted?
Forget it.
Whether you're
leaving a hotel, shopping for a pair of jeans or just trying to get around a
bystander, someone's going to pop out from the shadows with a neighborly
salutation, the enthusiasm of which may border on deranged.
2. Road trips
If we're talking
about something that can be done while seated, Americans are probably going to
excel at it.
Germany likes to
lay claim to the world's first road trip,
but having come of age at the same time as the automobile, the United States
was custom-built for it.
With roadside
oddities like Carhenge in Nebraska and the world's largest ball of paint in
Indiana, along with infamous rest areas and national parks (more on those
later) dotting America's majestic roadscape at uniform intervals, you're never
far from the next adventure.
Unless you're
driving through Texas.
3. Derbies
With all due
respect to the English city, the U.S. is the home of the derby in all its forms,
be it racing, smashing or haberdashing.
Originating in the
county fairs of the nation's 1950s backwoods, demolition derbies, like the one held annually in
Delaware County, New York, pit hulking early-model autos against one
another in contests of Americanly excessive ramming until only one remains
functional.
On the oval track,
Louisville's Kentucky Derby is a spectacle of horseshoed pageantry, while
roller derbies from Austin to Seattle are cataclysms of people-wheeled fury.
4. Beer
Not to keep taking
shots at Germany, but there's only so much you can do with barley and hops.
Live a little,
Üter!
By contrast,
American brewers aren't bound by purity restrictions on their craft, allowing
them to push the pint glass with new additives, processes, styles and malt and
hops strains moved through the largest number of breweries of any nation on
earth.
Whether it's
Portland, Oregon's Hopworks, Grand Rapids, Michigan's Founders, or Asheville,
North Carolina's Wicked Weed breweries, in no country is beer more innovative.
5. Diversity
The U.S. is a
microcosm of nearly every world culture, climate, landscape and category of
wildlife. (And whatever doesn't occur naturally gets recreated at Disney.)
Beaches extend from
Cape Cod to Kaanapali; bayous encircle the Gulf of Mexico; alpine mountains
streak the Rockies and Appalachians; rain forests span the Pacific Northwest;
deserts stretch across the Southwest.
Cougars, wolves,
bear, bison and mustangs roam plains and forests; gators, crocs, whales,
dolphins, turtles and snakes frequent the coasts; condors, eagles, falcons,
flamingos, bats and pterodactyls -- just making sure you're still with us -
inhabit the skies.
But of course the
Melting Pot concept was built on ethnic diversity. Despite the politics of
immigration, the U.S. has and will continue to welcome the world's huddled (and
also brilliant) masses, making it as heterogeneous as any nation on earth.
6. Canyons
Geo-diversity has
pocked much of the landscape with vast gorges and canyons that create expansive
pockets of pure emptiness ringed by the most stunning rock formations,
vegetation and slack-jawed tourists imaginable.
Unbelievable until
experienced, Utah's Bryce Canyon is the closest you can get to another planet
without tickets on Virgin Galactic.
Then there's Black
Canyon of the Gunnison (Colorado), Palo Duro Canyon (Texas), Canyon de Chelly
(Arizona), Sequioa and Kings Canyon (California), Waimea Canyon (Hawaii) and
hundreds more to round out a list so deep and wide that it makes the U.S. the
hands-down winner in this category even without mentioning the Grandest one of
them all.
7. National parks
Overlooked during
the westward expansion of the American frontier in the 1800s, Yellowstone was
made the world's first national park the way you might give the last kid picked
for kickball the top spot in the order.
Turns out it's one
of America's great national treasures, a tradition extended to 400 more areas
comprising more than 84 million acres of buttes, plateaus, rapids, coral reefs,
caverns, badlands, volcanoes, glaciers, falls, fjords, swamplands, sandstone
arches, mangroves, geysers, gift shops and excellent interpretive centers
ranging from coast to coast.
8. Eating
Make all the fat
jokes you want -- seriously, they're hilarious -- but no other nation offers
the portions and varieties of culinary experimentation found in the U.S.
This year's
gastronomic breakthrough was the cronut, a croissant-donut hybrid introduced by
Dominique Ansel Bakery in New York City.
It's just the
latest in a litany of extreme foods that's yielded curated cupcakes, ramen
burgers, sushirritoes, Korean tacos -- the only limit will be an eventual
shortage of truffles.
There's nothing the
home of super-sizing won't deep-fry, roll in bacon or drown with nacho cheese
sauce, proving Americans eat like none other.
Just don't ask them
to do math.
9. Sports
Most countries have
a national sport. The U.S. has four. (OK, three; you can have hockey, Canada.)
While the world's
most popular sport, soccer, has yet to gain critical traction in the U.S., it
also has the burden of competing with the seasonal panoply of baseball,
football, basketball and hockey.
That's tough enough
without NASCAR, golf and action sports like extreme death gliding and low-orbit
cloudboarding or whatever else is nipping at soccer's heels.
Some of the best
places to catch a game in the U.S. are Wrigley Field (Chicago) and Fenway Park
(Boston) for baseball; Tiger Stadium (Baton Rouge, Louisiana) and Lambeau Field
(Green Bay, Wisconsin) for football; and Cameron Indoor Stadium (Durham, North
Carolina) and Rupp Arena (Lexington, Kentucky) for college basketball.
10. Moving pictures
From
internationally beloved TV shows like Breaking Bad and The Daily Show to movies
like Avatar and anything the Coen brothers do to viral videos like Harlem Shake
and the Kardashian sex tape, America is the world's dramatic chipmunk.
Miswords: U.S.A was found and build by the European. The main vision when they
build this country is to be the world's dreams centre. We didn't see anything wrong being
an American then, blame the European :p
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