They represent the exceptionalism of America - the profound belief that America and everything American is superior to anything else created in the world, and therefore deserves to be gifted to humanity whether humanity wants it or not. The young people you meet in Europe are no different from their parents or grandparents, who live in exceptional ignorance of the rest of the world. That is probably the only really exceptional thing about America - its isolation and lack of curiosity. It is why the Pentagon can run its empire under the radar.

Even within Europe, where American students seem to be in perpetual party mode, I have met many thoughtful and interesting men and women who join their friends at the bars but also try to learn something about the language and culture. It is not a universal picture of hedonism with these young people. It sometimes happens that these youth, either while backpacking through Europe or on college tours, have an awakening. They meet an American student who is living there for a year and is fluent in the language and customs. They are in awe of such people, partly because they realize this person can really help them get around the city and negotiate what is otherwise a completely alien experience. They cannot comprehend what it would take to truly learn a language and live abroad.

My daughter is one of these "other" students. She speaks fluent Spanish and Arabic, and some French, and has probably visited 30 countries. She is currently studying Arabic in the middle east and hangs out mostly with locals her age anxious to learn English, or with similar foreign students, many of them from eastern Europe, Korea, France, Spain, Italy or Australia (Australians are especially itinerant and brave - you find them everywhere). There are, sadly, few Americans among the permanent foreign student population in the middle east, though she meets a fair share of Americans heading in and out of Iraq. These young people are the future citizens of the world, and they all have a propensity not only for languages, but an intense curiosity about other cultures. They also have trouble going home. Their old friends from high school and college can barely identify the countries in which they live abroad. They do not see America or its living standards as a seductive dream, and after awhile they long to leave the US again and explore life abroad. You can call that wanderlust, but the other side of wanderlust is unhappiness with one's own culture.

I'm going to get her to post some of her experiences her on the Agonist. She is quite the writer.

it's nothing that a good long Depression won't cure.

I did inhale.

I've noted the difference in American expats/travelers too. When you find Americans off the beaten path of easy foreign travel you've found people who purposefully step out of their comfort zone to learn about the world and themselves. But Western Europe is not outside the American comfort zone; wait, for many of us it actually is...and that's the worst part.

When i lived in Salzburg, i would actually have American tourists approach me (sometimes wearing a Detroit Tigers cap) and do the loud, slow, "Do you speak English?" My response varied depending on my mood and the vibe i got from the tourist...but i was not above making the tourist feel stupid. I never understood how a town like Salzburg could put Americans off balance; in short, it was embarrassing. And it left me little room to argue to Austrians that we aren't all dumb and ugly.

What i saw in places like Russia was even worse, because the "dumb ugly" set simply congregate with each other...making the whole much dumber and uglier than the sum of its parts. And in that case, the Americans were supposedly there to learn the language and live within the culture.

Unfortunately, the entitlement complex gone mad crowd are also the ones who return sure that they understand the world perfectly because they backpacked Europe for two months...and they find it wanting. They will go on to positions of power and wealth, while the good ones continue to travel and learn and push themselves. But they will often keep their life changing experiences to themselves because the experiences humble them and set them on the course to explore more.

The way to tell is this: if the person returns home and enjoys it for a short period of time before getting bored and making plans to leave again, they've learned. If the person is just thankful to be home again, they're trouble.

P.S. is there anything worse than stepping out of Amsterdam's central station and being accosted by dirty, American hippies who've taken up residence?

It's pretty obvious if you teach at a college. But it'll pass. These are the same kids who are now completely shocked the world is not begging them to take a great job right out of college.

do get it:
http://tbafhao.edublogs.org/
(full disclosure: I work with these kids)

I tend to stray off the beaten path (lately . . . Ryazan, Sochi, Sayan Mountains, etc.), so I rarely cross paths with any American expats, except in Kiev and Moscow, etc.

I did come across an American hippie on a bridge over a canal in Amsterdam. She was accosting people for change. I told her in Russian "I not understand", and she proceeded to lay into me with profanity laced tirade, repeatedly punctuated with fucking Russian bastard, which caused me to bust out laughing hysterically. Must have been all those Guinness's I drank. I am certain she was whacked out on something too, and it certainly was not Guinness.