Difficultly adjusting after relocating from DC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I’m in the suburb that inspired Mean Girls. Politically it’s not too different than my friends and collegues in DC, it’s just the lack of economic diversity and interest in much besides kids social life and their clothes and husbands bonus.

I’ve lived in NYC by plenty of hedge fund managers etc, upper east side types so get it, but so far the people just seems so one dimensional here.

I am racially mixed (not black) but a whole bunch of stuff. Usually I feel like I can blend in anywhere, but here I feel like I stick out. Honestly, I’ve never felt this way. Not even in school. I feel like I’m going thru HS in my late 30s

Oh come on! You’re in Evanston?

Seriously?

Chicago has tons of racial diversity. Evanston is even on the L so you can commute into the city in 20 minutes. It’s like living in Bethesda proximity to DC. I don’t understand how you would be the only non-white person in Evanston. At a minimum, there are tons of Asians.

[Anonymous]

Cant you move into Chicago? Lincoln Park or Hyde Park or wherever it is that cool people like to live?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cant you move into Chicago? Lincoln Park or Hyde Park or wherever it is that cool people like to live?

Usually schools are bad in such neighborhoods though

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I’m in the suburb that inspired Mean Girls. Politically it’s not too different than my friends and collegues in DC, it’s just the lack of economic diversity and interest in much besides kids social life and their clothes and husbands bonus.

I’ve lived in NYC by plenty of hedge fund managers etc, upper east side types so get it, but so far the people just seems so one dimensional here.

I am racially mixed (not black) but a whole bunch of stuff. Usually I feel like I can blend in anywhere, but here I feel like I stick out. Honestly, I’ve never felt this way. Not even in school. I feel like I’m going thru HS in my late 30s

Oh come on! You’re in Evanston?

Seriously?

Chicago has tons of racial diversity. Evanston is even on the L so you can commute into the city in 20 minutes. It’s like living in Bethesda proximity to DC. I don’t understand how you would be the only non-white person in Evanston. At a minimum, there are tons of Asians.

Have you ever read about the race issues in Evanston schools? Also OP. Never said she lived there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cant you move into Chicago? Lincoln Park or Hyde Park or wherever it is that cool people like to live?

Usually schools are bad in such neighborhoods though

Ah, and you reveal your true colors with this comment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I’m in the suburb that inspired Mean Girls. Politically it’s not too different than my friends and collegues in DC, it’s just the lack of economic diversity and interest in much besides kids social life and their clothes and husbands bonus.

I’ve lived in NYC by plenty of hedge fund managers etc, upper east side types so get it, but so far the people just seems so one dimensional here.

I am racially mixed (not black) but a whole bunch of stuff. Usually I feel like I can blend in anywhere, but here I feel like I stick out. Honestly, I’ve never felt this way. Not even in school. I feel like I’m going thru HS in my late 30s

I thought Mean Girls was based on McLean and Langley\.

+1

Worst part is, they grew up in McLean/Langley and never left......and never grew up!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kansas City? Tell us OP

Sounds like KC to me. I'm so sorry OP. I'm from there, not a minority and couldn't stand the lack of diversity and the racial divide, came here for grad school and never looked back. There are pockets of people that aren't as stereotypical although they won't be minorities. Check out groups in Brookside on the MO side if you are in KC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the suburb that inspired Mean Girls?

I thought it was Winnetka. But Chicago isn't what I'd think of as flyover...

PP here. Apparently it was Evanston. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_Girls But I was close.

You are really struggling to find interesting people in Chicago?

That is where the movie takes place, but Tina Fey used her experience in Upper Darby, PA and the author of "Queen Bees and Wanna Bees" is from the DC area.

We are getting off point ... but the author of Queens Bees is from DC and went to Maret. Tina Fey wrote the movie Mean Girls and based it in part on the book Queen Bees and in part on her personal experience at high school in Upper Darby, PA. The movie is set in Evanston. I am not sure which of these places OP means since I would not call any of them flyover country, although presumably she means Evanston ... This was a great movie.

Op, I think you need to reflect on the very movie you refer to. There is more to everyone than a superficial exterior. I am tired of the DC intellectual and cultural snobbiness. I grew up in NYC - guess what, many people there look down on DC as bumpkinville. I think that attitude is ridiculous as well but I admit when I first moved here I believed it. Then I got to know people and found lots of smart, fun, interesting, savvy people here who I clicked with. I am sure there are many where you live as well. But if you have a superior attitude or a chip on your shoulder, you won’t find them (or if you do, they won’t want to spend time with you).

[Anonymous]

OP, maybe you chose Winnetka/Glencoe/Kenilworth but Oak Park/River Forest sounds like it would be more your scene. Funny, I think it’s segregated around here too with schools like Langley and Discovery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the suburb that inspired Mean Girls?

I thought it was Winnetka. But Chicago isn't what I'd think of as flyover...

PP here. Apparently it was Evanston. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_Girls But I was close.

You are really struggling to find interesting people in Chicago?

That is where the movie takes place, but Tina Fey used her experience in Upper Darby, PA and the author of "Queen Bees and Wanna Bees" is from the DC area.

We are getting off point ... but the author of Queens Bees is from DC and went to Maret. Tina Fey wrote the movie Mean Girls and based it in part on the book Queen Bees and in part on her personal experience at high school in Upper Darby, PA. The movie is set in Evanston. I am not sure which of these places OP means since I would not call any of them flyover country, although presumably she means Evanston ... This was a great movie.

Op, I think you need to reflect on the very movie you refer to. There is more to everyone than a superficial exterior. I am tired of the DC intellectual and cultural snobbiness. I grew up in NYC - guess what, many people there look down on DC as bumpkinville. I think that attitude is ridiculous as well but I admit when I first moved here I believed it. Then I got to know people and found lots of smart, fun, interesting, savvy people here who I clicked with. I am sure there are many where you live as well. But if you have a superior attitude or a chip on your shoulder, you won’t find them (or if you do, they won’t want to spend time with you).

I'm just pointing out that Upper Darby is a working class suburb of Philadelphia with a large African American and now immigrant population. It may have been slightly more mixed during Tina Fey's day but it was certainly not an affluent suburb by any stretch of the imagination. So it's odd to be lumping it with the rich white women of the OP's posts.

[Anonymous]

We've had plenty of posters complain about not fitting in when moving to just about every DC suburb. We've had plenty of posters complain about not fitting in when moving to just about any city in the country.

It's not the city that's the problem, OP, it's that you are new in unfamiliar territory and it always takes time to meet people you like and want to be around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cant you move into Chicago? Lincoln Park or Hyde Park or wherever it is that cool people like to live?

Usually schools are bad in such neighborhoods though

Ah, and you reveal your true colors with this comment.

I am not op!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mean girls is based on the New Trier School District as is every single John Hughes movie.

It isn't a John Hughes film.

Reread the sentence. It didn’t say it was a John Hughes movie. He was dead by then.

I thought the meaning of your sentence (both Mean Girls AND every single John Hughes movie was based on the NT School District) was clear & did not think you were limping MG in with the other JH movie.

FWIW, however, though JH did not make MG, he was still very much alive when it came out (2004). He didn’t die until 2009.

[Anonymous]

OP, there are many Chicago suburbs that are mixed. Or move to Hyde Park or something in town. It is pretty rich to move to a wealthy suburb like Evanston and then complain about lack of socioeconomic diversity. You moved to a place where you have to be wealthy to afford to live there. It is like complaining about the lack of socioeconomic diversity in Malibu or Georgetown.

[Anonymous]

You have to be more open minded. It’s hard when you haven’t had to be before, but in the long run you will be so much happier!