America

I recently mentioned to my sister that a friend of mine had spent a summer in the Gaza strip doing charity work. Moments before she got on the plane she had to sign a disclaimer detailing that should she contract a disease, lose anything (camera, passport, limb, organ or indeed life) that she was not covered and that the company she was going with could accept no responsibility and provide no compensation.

Needless to say, she could not get any travel insurance for the trip either. She signed the form, went to Gaza, did good things and came home unscathed.

I told my sister this. And I understand why it was necessary to sign such a thing, but I also registered my disbelief at the existence of such a form, and also my awe that my friend had managed to sign the damn thing; had I been confronted with a similar form my overactive imagination would have created far too many dreadful scenarios for me to even contemplate signing away my life.

To which me sister replied, “Don’t be so silly Jessica. In America I had to sign one of those to go on a bouncy castle”

For me, that really seems to sum up the American mindset.