I just tried watching Season 4 of Grey's Anatomy on my laptop in my bedroom - thought it would be a nice way to wind down before going to bed. Much to my chagrin, an error message popped up on the screen, telling me that the region code for the DVD does not match the region code for the computer. Did I wish to change the region code? But hold on, it helpfully told me, you can only do this one more time.
Can't tell you how disappointed I am. I am tired enough that I don't want to go out to the living room to watch the dang thing. This different coding for DVDs is just plain annoying - and why did they put such restrictions in the first place? Having lived abroad for so long now, this is not the only example of such differences stumping me and annoying the heck out of me.
Example 2: Paper sizes
Why do papers have to be different sizes? In the US the norm is the letter size. In Europe, the norm is the A4 - slightly narrower, slightly longer. WHY?? It's not like the difference between the letter size and the legal size. It's a tiny teeny difference. I've also noticed that the US letter papers tend to be a bit darker and yellower than the A4 papers I buy in France. Can someone explain this to me?
Example 3: Plugs/voltage/outlets
Why oh why do we need different voltage? Can we ever envisage a time when we can travel without adapters? Not only adapters, some appliances also need 'transformers'. I blew up an electronic globe that Hana got as a gift (sorry, C and J!) because I neglected to use this transforming add-on. Why do appliances need to be transformed and adapted in the first place?
Example 4: Sheet sizes
Twins, Tall Twins, Full, Queen and King. Nice and Simple (though I did just see a size called Cal. King on Target Online today that puzzled me - hmmm, I must do a better job keeping up with such things). No such simplicity, at least in France. Why couldn't they just adapt it to, say, Jumeaux, Plein, Reine and Roi?? No can do. They go with "1-person" and "2-people", which in and of itself would be fine, but no, there is more. The sizes of the sheets are different. That I could probably live with too, if it was only that I have to deal with. But nooooo. The comforter cover sizes are different. The ones I have bought here are either too big for my US queen comforter so that the down gets lost in there, or they are simply too small so that the blanket does not quite fit inside. Simply maddening, is what this is.
Example 5: Game cartridges/discs
Similar to the DVD example above, our US-bought Wii only plays US-bought Wii games. Hello??? I suppose they don't want people buying cheap games from the US to play elsewhere, but then this brings me to the age-old question, why must everything (and it is, virtually everything) be so much cheaper in the US? OK that topic is tangential to this post so I shall fume about that some other time.
Example 6: Daylight Savings Day
This may not neatly fit in with the other examples, but an example nonetheless of senseless differences - today the US turned the clock forward to Spring time. We in Europe do not do this for another 3 weeks. Not sure which party is being stubborn, but oh can we just stop this nonsense?
I know there are many more examples but I am tired and losing steam. But before I close out, I must mention the metric system. Now that I am quite the baker, I've been stumped by US recipes calling for cups vs. French recipes calling for grams way too many times, not to mention oven temperatures in Farenheit versus Celsius. Also read somewhere that the US is one of only three countries not using the metric system (the other two are Burma and Liberia!).
So clearly we are no where near this one world utopia. Certain regional differences I can tolerate and attribute to important historical reference points or cultural quirks. But the examples of the differences above are just simply annoying and unnecessary! Agree?
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