As an ex-pat kid in the 70's, nothing said America to me more than Texas. I misunderstood my mother's explanation of the American state. "There are cattle in Texas," she told me as we drove home from the international school in our Fiat station wagon, "and oil. There are great big oil fields with rigs." We lived in a semi-rural area of Switzerland, and our next door neighbors were dairy farmers, so I had close-up…

If there’s one bar I’ve always wanted to drink in, it’s the Mos Eisley cantina on Tatooine, from the first Star Wars. As a child I was fascinated by the curious assortment of aliens who patronized the establishment: the thing that looks like a crocodile wearing a red beret; the bug-eyed instrumentalists; the mousy creature asking the bartender for another drink. Although Mos Eisley is clearly dangerous – Obi Wan Kenobi introduced Luke to it with…