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calculators in Russia
Wednesday, October 27 1999
Dmitri is one of the website producers at the company where I work. He emigrated from Russia with his parents when he was still a little boy, and as an adult he's gone through a series of jobs at various levels of management at several technology companies. Today I asked him if he ever did anything with computers back when he lived in Russia. "Oh God no!" he said, rolling his eyes. Then he added, "My uncle was an engineer and he saved for many months so he could buy a calculator. I remember when I saw that calculator with the numbers on the screen and I thought it was so cool. Then, a little while after I came to America I was in a dumpster looking for stuff and I found two calculators, batteries and everything! I couldn't help thinking, here I had these two calculators for free while my poor uncle had to save for months for only one!"
I'm always delighted when I find a trace of what makes me different in one of my co-workers, since it happens precious little. I usually have to content myself with traces of cynicism or Simpsons appreciation. But Dmitri's dumpster diving tale was something entirely different. I remember mentioning my dumpster diving to a group of co-workers at lunch almost a year ago and being met with a figgetty, uncomfortable silence. Back then I was still so familiar with people like me, Big Funsters and the like, that I didn't even consider how shocking such things are to your average SUV-purchase-aspiring middle American.
On the other hand, marijuana smoking is so widespread amongst the employees at my workplace that I can only assume that it represents the norm of American behaviour, at least here in California.
For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?991027 feedback
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