The Californians

When I first saw the Saturday Night Live skit, “The Californians” I was not sure what I was watching.  Were they going to just have a bunch of people with tan skin and long blond hair talk like surfer dudes?  For the most part yes, that is pretty much what they did.  And I laughed.  I thought it was hilarious, because for the most part what they were saying was kind of accurate. 

I am from California.  When I first moved to Chicago for school I didn’t think that I had an accent, but my friends quickly informed me that I was wrong.  Apparently I had a Californian accent.  I didn’t know that was even a thing but it was.  I always have my sunglasses with me and I usually wear them even when it is not that sunny outside, because that is just what I grew up doing.  The thing that really gets me about the skit though is how all of the characters talk in reference to highway and street names.  I do this all the time with people I meet from Southern California.  Most of the time when I tell people where I am from I can really tell them where I am from because they do not know any cities other than Los Angeles and San Francisco.  So when I meet people who are also from California I get a chance to talk about where I am actually from and have a full conversation with them.  The other thing that was weirdly accurate was when all of the characters stop what they are doing and begin to look at  and fix their hair in the mirror. which is something I always do.

Now to be honest I was not really offended by the stereotyping that SNL did about people from California.  I have never really had people poke fun at the fact that I am from California so it was a new experience, but even though they depicted Californians as slow talking, blonde hair, tanned skin, sunglass wearing, less that intelligent people, I do not believe that they had a malicious intent with the skit. I thought it was funny and my friends said that it was a pretty good representation of me.  So I laughed at myself along with all of my friends, and then looked at my self in the mirror to make sure that my hair had not moved too much.