Going to the New England area for college has been an invigorating experience with brand new wonders for me. The local slang is something of great interest to me. I had no idea that people called it a bubbler instead of a water fountain. This is totally dumb because at no point does the fountain bubble. My local friends say it's because it used to bubble, but hey, that’s their opinion on the matter. It is a water fountain since you know it is a fountain full of water.

Prior to going to college, I lived in Texas. Everyone doesn't ride horses to school, believe it or not. However, I do know some people who did. The most dramatic thing about the linguistics of Texans has got to be using y’all, which obviously means you all but it saves time. The feeling of Texas is “warmer,” and I don’t just mean the weather. Everyone is super nice and really wants to know how you are doing. People will approach you and just have a conversation. In the Northeast, people mind their own business and keep to themselves. It’s colder — maybe it's because of the weather. Causation does not mean correlation.

I didn’t always live in Texas. I moved to Texas in the middle of my fourth grade year from the greatest state in the Union, California. There, people seemed to be more relaxed. Dude was how you called people regardless of their gender. San Jose was where I was raised until I moved to Texas. There, skater culture was bigger, and the climate was always 70 something with just the right amount of clouds. I have been back, and it seems like the same kind of thing. People in California seem to be right between Texans and New Englanders. It’s kind of funny how slang develops differently in each region of the United States. Of course, the slang is even more strange and wonderful in the rest of the world.

The strangest striking colloquialism is how people ask for a drink in the United States. In the South, you ask for a Coke and the waitress asks for which one. Everywhere else, you ask for a Coke and the waitress hands you a Coca-Cola. In the Midwest, the term for a drink is a pop, perhaps from the sound of opening a great can. And finally, you can also call it the most generic term of a soda. There is no confusion no matter where you ask for a soda. I personally think soda is the best way.

People have different words for the same thing. It becomes more evident in college when people of differing backgrounds come together. College is wonderful in that manner; it’s a dive into the immersive culture of the world. All I got to say, “What’s up y’all, nice meeting you at the bubbler, and that's a nice Coke you got there.”