On "American Efficiency"

I am most definitely from the United States.  You know how I know?  The roads here are awful.  No, but really – to get to my house, you need to brave a “hill” which is actually the side of the mountain, and sometimes a waterfall during the rain.  It has covert rock croppings in the middle that take extra pleasure in watching you fall spectacularly.  There are ravines where there are not rocks in the road (okay, so the ravines are just really big, long road canyons) that you will also fall into/over.  My North Americanness entered the equation one night when I had a talk with my host mother, after a particularly perilous journey back to the house. 

“Mama Helena, how do people not fall on the roads here?”

“You have to walk carefully, slowly, and pick up your feet. But people here still fall.”

“Do they fall all the time or only on roads they don’t know as well?”

“All the time.”

So, stereotypically, these were my thoughts: If everyone falls, why don’t they fix it? If the roads are wiped out during every frequent rain here, why don’t they fix that? Or at least try to?

See, I like efficiency.  I’ve met people who like it more (Hi James!) but I definitely miss it now that it’s gone.  If this town pooled resources together, I have no doubt they would be able to better the roads.  But they don’t.  Because the road still eventually leads to their houses.