On hating Americans.

Not so long ago, I discovered Skype and lately I have been skyping with a number of people from all over the world, most from the US of A. They seem to be regular folks, in fact, it is practically impossible to know that they are Americans without looking into their profiles, unless of course if you are engaging them in a conversation about America and Americans. The point is, they are regular folks... well, almost.
It seems to me that most of the Americans I met online have a few things in common, among them,
They have this impression that people around them world hate Americans.
They generally have very vague ideas about the rest of the world.
Put the two premises together and we get a group pf people who don't really know the world but think people there hate them.
Admittedly, there is anti-US sentiment practically everywhere but saying that everybody hates Americans is like saying that everybody in the US voted for George Bush, more or less.
Since my conversations with my American friends, I have been observing American tourists around KL. Here are a few of my findings,
Firstly, American tourists are easy to spot and recognize. I noticed that the younger ones tend to go to great lengths to dress in a peculiar fashion. I know they don't dress like that back home, so this means that they are dressed in a manner that they think would help them fit in better with the locals based on their perception of how the locals would dress. This of course makes them stand out like sore thumbs. For example: I was at my usual haunt (The Mall) at lunch time a few days ago when I noticed a small group of American tourists among the lunch crowd. In the middle of the pants, ties, kurungs and kebayas, you find Bermuda pants, faded T-shirts and shades, trying hard to look inconspicuous. It was a blazing hot day but a few yards away was another Bermuda pants and faded T-shirt leaning against a railing soaking the sun while waiting for a taxi. The other taxi users were locals and were, of course, waiting in the shade. People walking past this sun-worshiper somewhat obviously tried to avoid him as they walked by wearing the same expression that you see on people's faces as they walk past a shabbily dressed man having a loud conversation with his remisier while holding a shoe to his ears instead of a handphone.
At that point, I hypothesized that most people, at least most people here, do not hate Americans, they simply think that generally Americans are mentally not that stable. By they way, recognizing the Americans is easy and to verify it you simply need to listen to them talking, especially when they try to talk to the locals: for a number of them talking in a foreign tongue means talking in one of the Americans accents loudly and slowly. To their credit, some try to speak the local tongues: that is when the locals would scratch their heads trying to figure out what the tourists are trying to say. It gets more peculiar when they try to speak tonal languages like Cantonese. You are often left wondering why this person is asking you to show him the way to the wet market at night. You ask them why they want to go there and they will reply that they are looking for 'action'. You, of course, are left wondering to yourself what kind of action you can get at the closed fish market in the middle of the night.
Two further illustrations.
It usually makes sense to ask what is in the food before actually getting it and eating it. Two American youths once came into the restaurant sat at a table next to some locals who were eating. They said to the waiter, “we'll have whatever they are having”. Of course the waited obliged by bringing them the Masak lemak cili api, ulam and sambal belacan lada burung that they asked for. To make things worse, the youths did not order any drinks before attacking their food.
In another instance, some American tourists ended up at the place where some people were slaughtering a cow for a wedding feast. Near them, a group of people waiting patiently for the beef soup they made from the more difficult parts to cook like the joints. This group was having a tough time stopping themselves from slobbering from the aroma of the cooking soup. Not too far a way was the small group of American tourists looking positively ill after seeing a cow slaughtered in the Islamic way and then processed for distribution. When someone offered them bowls of the soup they made from the cow they had just slaughtered. One of the tourists ran off into nearby woods and threw up. My guess is this was a vegetarian group.
I would say that while there are those who hate Americans, this is probably not generally true. Generally, we observe the behavior of our American visitors and think that a psychiatrist would probably make a fortune if he is working in the US of A.
Then again, observing my fellow countrymen, I have to grudgingly admit that whatever psychological imbalances or intellectual deficiencies the Americans have, they certain do not not have the monopoly. All in all, they are just like us.