seconding WOW here! I am just first generation American, and I was born in NYC, and like any home town gal, i do think i live the best place on earth! but i love traving in america, I liked Georgia, (but disliked Atlanta... of course it didn't hold a candle to NY,) but Georgia, out side of the Atlanta, Stone Mountain, the countryside, the kudzu, it was beautiful.. same in Texas.. hated Dallas, but took a day trip wandering the country side.. Even the weeds by the side of the road caught my eye-- such different weeds than the North East... and so pretty!
I liked Seattle, and SF, but for the most part, what i have like best is the country side. this is such a beautiful country--(right now, for me, Wyoming -- takes the prize for being the most beautful.. breathtakingly so!)
but my kids liked alabama, (i have never been there) my daughter brought home a bag of the red clay soil to show me... she thought it was so pretty.. as she said, even the dirt is dressed up in colored clothes!
Now i will admit, because the north east is a major media center, our dialect is one that makes it into the news and movies, and television.. As much as i love NY, I don't think any less of other parts of the this country..
(as for other countries.. well, Cork, is actually nicer than dublin, (but i shouldn't say that publicly, since my parents family has a 500 year histroy in dublin, and london is beautiful, Rome is so much like NY is so many ways (yes, i know that have 2000 year old ruins, but really, its just like NY only every speaks italian..)Paris is, Paris.
and i started this, i realize i like europian cities, but US countryside!
and while in some part of the US, you call all soda coke, and in other parts its pop, and still other places tonic will still work, our language difference are not divisive!
