I saw many things, heard many stories on my way from the East to the West coast. Some made sense to me, some less and some none at all. The United States did not feel like a nation to me, or a country, they felt more like a patchwork of nations and countries, of opinions and attitudes, held together by a flag, a five-page constitution, a strong belief in the military and two oceans that sandwich it all together; it felt like a head-on collision between a third world country, a high-tech company and the remains of an empire.
I noticed how important stories are. US-Americans certainly like their stories, like to talk and like to scare each other. They seem to have an exceptional talent for horror stories.
The Third Planet 