Word: hometowners
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...foreign cultures, as if every child of empire wanted to do something noble, like translate the Bhagavad Gita or teach for a year in Sierra Leone. Sadly, not so. In Britain, the imperialist adventure produced a belief that Britons were better than anyone with dark skin. In my hometown, imperialism bred a pervasive racism. When John Barnes, a great black soccer player, first played for Liverpool, the fans greeted him by throwing bananas on the field and making monkey noises. This was not in the 1950s...
Moreover, the days when a girl lived with Mom and Dad before marrying the boy next door are long gone, and with them the ease of gathering guests for a local wedding. Many young people live far from their hometown, and their parents may also have moved. For a bride who grew up in Nebraska, attended college in Chicago and has lived in California, New York and Arizona, her current residence may seem less than a home base. Chances are, no matter where a couple holds a wedding these days, people will have to travel to attend, so it makes...
...wedding may seem like the next iteration in the extravagant trend that ushered in mega-weddings, but most couples cite their desire for an intimate and informal affair as a reason to marry afar. Travel costs whittle down the invite list, making a destination wedding less expensive than a hometown affair, especially for couples from big cities, where venue and vendor rates have soared. Because guests are expected to pay for their travel and lodging (in addition to gifts, bridesmaid dresses and so forth), "will attends" are more likely to include only the most committed family members and friends. Some...
Avoiding a hometown wedding can make the event less about other people--Mom's business partners, Dad's second cousin--and more about the bride and groom. Choosing neutral territory can also mitigate family conflicts. Marta Lowe, 32, who lives in Maryland, got married on a farm in Vermont rather than in her hometown, Olympia, Wash., where she feared her estranged divorced parents would spoil the atmosphere. "If I got married where I grew up, people would have come just to glare at each other," Lowe says. With rehearsal dinner and postwedding brunch the new norm, brides and grooms today...
...exploding in the provinces, some of China's 800 million farmers are finally acting out, threatening the social stability that the nation's leaders have long considered their No. 1 priority. Last week, as peasants learned that outsiders possibly exposed to the SARS virus would be quarantined in their hometowns without the locals' consent or knowledge, riots erupted in various parts of the country, from villages near the northern city of Chengde to those in the central province of Henan. The turmoil is the most extreme manifestation of a SARS paranoia fueled by a public increasingly distrustful of government propaganda...