Tell Me About Atlanta

One way in which I see the US differently after experiencing Europe is by noticing how huge it is. It takes six hours to fly from coast to coast! Sure, it takes that long to cross Europe from Lisbon to Helsinki, too. But think of all the languages people speak along the way: Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, French, Italian, German, Danish...and I'm not even halfway done. To me, the size of European countries and the governance of a smaller area seems more practical, on a more human scale. It makes the US seem like a Super Size country, all speaking one language, all pledging allegiance to one flag, with all states submitting to federal rule. Personally, I wouldn't mind more differences among states...

I've had some questions about the city of Atlanta and the surrounding area from some German friends, and I thought I'd put our new home into European terms and provide some statistics:

The area of the State of Georgia is 59,441 square miles (153,951 square kilometers). That's bigger than Greece. Georgia is bigger than Austria or the Czech Republic. It's also bigger than the combined areas of Denmark, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Belgium. It's a little under half the size of Germany. Georgia is pretty much average in size for US states, ranking 24th out of 50.

The summer Olympics were in Atlanta in 1996. Atlanta is the capital and largest city of Georgia. The metropolitan area of Atlanta has a population of 5.5 million spread through 28 counties - this is the same population as the industrial Ruhr area where we're living now, and more than the metropolitan area of Berlin, Germany's biggest city.

Atlanta's airport is the busiest airport in the world according to passenger traffic, followed by Chicago-O'Hare and London Heathrow.

Atlanta is a four-hour drive inland from the Atlantic Ocean. It takes 7.5 hours to drive to Disney World, in Orlando, or to New Orleans. It's 10.5 hours to Washington, D.C.

Famous Atlantans:
- Martin Luther King, Jr., was born in Atlanta and pastored a church there until his death in 1968.
- Jimmy Carter - there's a presidential library!
- Margaret Mitchell wrote "Gone with the Wind" from her apartment in Atlanta. It's still open for tours and writers' workshops, and she's buried in Atlanta.
- Athletic stars: Hank Aaron (baseball), Bobby Jones (golf), and John Heisman (coach at Georgia Tech, with namesake trophy), to name a few.
- Musicians: Ray Charles, Usher, Little Richard, The B-52's, Robert Shaw, Chris Tomlin, John Mayer, Indigo Girls, Third Day, Ciara...
-And I didn't yet mention rappers: Kanye West, T.I., OutKast, Ludacris, and maybe 40 more.
- Stars: Julia Roberts, Holly Hunter, Jane Fonda, Dakota Fanning, Ryan Seacrest, and more.
- The founders of Coca-Cola, Home Depot, and Chick-fil-A all founded and base their businesses in Atlanta.
- Chris Scarborough, professor of chemistry at Emory University

Georgia on my Mind

Throughout the last six months, Chris and I watched the forty universities he applied to get whittled down to the one. While waiting for the results to flow in, we fell into a routine of medieval superstition in order to identify where, in fact, we would land. After every little thing that happened, most notably the shooting star that Chris saw after discovering that USC was hiring, we would say, only half-jokingly, "It's a sign!"

Well, looking back on it, Emory University offered its share of signs.

1) It was Chris' first application, so we took a picture of his email as he was about to click "send" on September 23, 2010.  It's the only application we photographed; it's a sign!

2) After clicking "send" and preparing other applications in the following week, Chris noticed a spelling error in Emory's teaching statement. He'd reworked some sentences and, instead of replacing experimentation with experimenting, accidentally left it as experimentating. How mortifying. That's why, when Emory called with an invitation to interview, we began referring to all the "experimentating" Chris will be expected to do once he's there, or that maybe he can collaborate with other people there who experimentate?

3) This one's good. Some of our bedtime reading during application season was a fantastic translation of Grimms' fairy tales. Every time I opened the front cover, my eyes would be caught by the translator's dedication:

Not only is Joyce Crick telling us to go to Georgia, but she is also hinting for me to name a future daughter or puppy Rose.

4) When Chris was in Atlanta for his first interview at Emory, I got to talk with him on Skype. He clearly adored the character of the chemistry department and was impressed enough with the area to tell me that he could imagine us liking it there. There were lots of trees and birdsongs in winter and even a band for me to join! I already had the (slightly sinking) feeling that Atlanta was going to be in my future.

5) With a name like Holly - or Daisy Charlotte, for that matter - we will fit right in. The movie we watched on the airplane on the way into Atlanta was set in Atlanta and the main character was named Holly; in addition, practically at every restaurant we visited, someone at an adjacent table was apparently named Holly.

The signs were there. Now that it's official - we are moving to Atlanta in August for Chris to work at Emory University as an assistant professor in chemistry - I am gearing up for the move. Not so much the practicalities, but the gusto I need to fuel such a change. Maybe it's resorting to 15-year-old behavior, but I made myself a "Let's Go to Atlanta" music playlist on the free listening website, Grooveshark. It's a sign to myself that I can do this and that it will be fun, even if there's a little blues along the way.