Falling in love with America in Austin, Texas

Amber Marks, Times:

I leaf through the airport lounge copy of Essentially America in my first attempt to embrace the culture of the United States. It’s going to be difficult. I last visited North America 17 years ago to see my father, Howard Marks. He was serving the fifth of his 25-year prison sentence for trading in marijuana.

Miraculously, he was paroled in time for my 18th birthday and now I’m on my way to Austin to attend the premiere of a film based on his autobiography, Mr Nice. Paradoxically, my father can’t be here. He is banned from entering the US.

Essentially America features a quote from Mark Twain’s The Innocents Abroad: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness and most people need it sorely on these accounts.” Unconvinced, I feel I have good grounds to hate everything about the US.

The seeds of my contempt are buried deeper than the Drug Enforcement Administration’s rude interruption of my family life in 1988. I blamed the US for a lot of things. It was a scapegoat for our drugs policy, gun crime, legal aid reforms, booming prison population, unchecked capitalism, shopping malls, surveillance society, bad television and obesity.

I had no desire to visit the US, no matter how many of my friends told me New York was “cool”. So I was surprised and embarrassed to find myself in a bookshop last month, requesting a guide to Texas: deathplace of JFK; birthplace of George Bush.

Hours spent in Chicago airport awaiting my connection fail to assuage my prejudices. Strangers gorge on garish snacks, the only leisure pursuit available in this starkly lit hellhole. The women in the lavatories smell of sweets and I wonder if it’s the scent of their sweat or a fashionable fragrance. Repetitive announcements inform me that the security status is orange and automated external defibrillators dot the walls.

To my relief, Austin-Bergstrom airport is a stark contrast to Chicago O’Hare. In place of security updates sneak the softer sounds of country music laced with rock and blues. Bands take to the stage in the centre of the airport terminal, welcoming arrivals to the “live music capital of the world”. The airport shops sell souvenirs emblazoned with the caption “Keep Austin Weird” — an initiative to keep corporate giants out of the city.

Within half an hour of my plane landing, I am looking out of the hotel window as the world’s largest urban bat colony swoops over the leafy banks of Ladybird Lake. Canoeists, joggers and cyclists stop to admire the seasonal spectacle. I venture down to the river bank. Rejuvenated by the warmth and freshness of the air, I stroll over Congress Avenue Bridge and into the SoCo — South Congress — neighbourhood.

The mood there is festive. A busker offers cigarettes to passers-by. Educated writers fill the pages of free magazines available in the idiosyncratic bars and restaurants on this long strip of road. Shop windows celebrate Mexican art traditions, vintage medical instruments, strange sweets and popular vinyl. Oak trees laden with fairy lights grow in beer gardens and motel courtyards.

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The enthusiasm of Austinites is infectious. In response to recession fears, chefs from the city’s most celebrated restaurants have opened “trailer chic” gourmet-food establishments in parks across the city, where fresh produce is wood-grilled and sold at rock-bottom prices. The people are friendly but don’t tell me gratingly to “have a nice day”.

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George Bush was born in Connecticut, not Texas. But otherwise her description of Austin is pretty close. It is an exceptionally clean city, especially around the Capitol and University. Despite having too many liberals, it is a fun place with good places to eat and enjoy entertainment. It is always interesting to see an outsider's opinion of something close to home.