Law, Partially

There are advantages and disadvantages to marrying a foreigner. Chinese New Year brings to mind an advantage and disadvantage. Advantage: there is never any argument over whose family we will spend the most important holidays with: my family for Christmas and Thanksgiving, her family for Chinese New Year. Disadvantage: spending one of these holidays with the family is going to involve a very long trip. In fact, to spend Chinese New Year with Christine's family involves not just a trip to Singapore, but another trip to Malaysia as well. Never mind the difficulty and expense of travelling, however, because our 2018 trip to the former Straits Settlements was very enjoyable. In the kampung It is traditional that a Chinese family would spend Chinese New Year at the husband's parents' home. Christine's husband doesn't have any immediate Chinese family, and, besides, we already spent November and December with his family. Christine grew up spending the holiday wit...

Away from home, in London as we are, we celebrated some of Americans' favorite holidays: Thanksgiving and Christmas. Missing our family members, we imported different groups for these holidays. Aunt Mawti, Laura ("Auntie Biscuit"), and Erica for Thanksgiving. Nainai, Gugu, and Kevin for Christmas. Many adventures away from home ensued. To Thanksgiving The term "citizen of the world" is bullshit. Holidays easily prove this true. Away from your home country, when a holiday arises that you would have spent at home with friends and family, you will pine to celebrate like them, with wistful thoughts of home. The Thanksgiving holiday for U.S. people has very specific connotations -- celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November, with visions of a well-defined (and probably mythical) pilgrim group, cornucopias, turkeys, stuffings, gravies, sweet and savory pies, etc. According to Wikipedia, Thanksgiving is celebrated a few other places but not by the majority of t...

In his narrative political history, The Origins of Political Order , Francis Fukuyama described the long road toward creating ordered societies as "getting to Denmark," with Denmark as the terminal example of a prosperous, stable, and peaceful political entity (other examples include Japan, Germany, New Zealand, etc.). Presumably, creating such political order is the goal of all states, so they are each on their way to Denmark. As the FD Linges travel with comparative institutional analysis  in mind, we were excited and curious to get to Denmark for a visit. Bob, at the Christiansborg Palace, welcomes you all to Denmark. According to Wikipedia , this palace is a former royal residence and now the seat of the Danish Parliament, the Danish Prime Minister's Office, and the Supreme Court of Denmark. According to Bob, it was a place we needed to walk past to get to our next restaurant.  In addition to eating on vacation, now with our walking toddler, we also ...