Now before I start, please know that I’m not ranting, just observing. I haven’t been to the rallies. I think that immigrant labor is one of the things that makes America great. If you don’t think that globalization is a good thing then you should move to the country, stop shopping at Wal-Mart or Costco, grow your own food and darn your own socks.
That said.
The Nolensville Road stretch of Nashville is certainly an interesting place. In one shopping mall close to my office, you have a Chinese market, and Indian restaurant, a Mexican meat market, and a Nigerian restaurant. All next to each other. (What percentage of the world’s culinary tastes are NOT represented here?) A few blocks up the street there is an Ethiopian restaurant. (I assume they serve what ever the Red Cross drops off every day.) Outside of the formerly standing Harding Mall there was a restaurant called the “New Country Buffet.” I never ate there because I never figured out which new country the food came from. Then there’s the grandaddy of them all, the K&S; World Market, with all of the signs out front, I swear that one of them is Klingon. Diversity is not lacking in this part of town. You can’t get much more global than this.
So what brought this on? Tonight with dinner, I got change. This is what I was given:
Based on the exchange rate, I made off 1.42134 cents off of the drive-thru guy. Now I’ve demonstrated that it’s a pretty globalized part of town, but who knew that the Nolensville Road stretch had adopted the Euro?
Cool, that’s the first one I’ve seen.
The now defunct coffee shop, Bean Central, in the high rent district of West End used to have a display case (actually, it looked like a fish aquarium) in which customers would drop off foreign currency. The thing quickly collected a wide variety of monies. Of course this all came from clientel of the shop after returning from their various trips to exotic places.
I imagine Nashville is the most diverse town in the South.
Ha! Some Eurotourist was trying to leave his trash currency. The 2-cent and 1-cent euro pieces are never used here in Greece at least. People just trash them.
The K&S; is a hotbed of conspiracy. I live within walking distance but I’m scared to walk. Nolensville Rd. is not what I’d call culturally diverse. Rather, it’s devoid of Anglo-Americans and getting worse all the time.
That said, I’ve got a two bedroom condo on the market. Mention Tim Morgan and I’ll make you a heck of a deal.
-Jon