My parents and I moved to the US from Russia when I was ten. I started learning English when I was six and now don’t really have an accent. This is why most people who meet me can’t tell that I wasn’t born in the States. I delude myself into thinking I don’t look all that Russian/Jewish, but obviously I do since my appearance is what most often gives me away (that, and the fact that I cross my sevens).
The immigration process wasn’t nearly as tough on me as it was on my parents. At 10 years old, I was just self centered enough to be insensitive the pain and separation that my parents were going through, having left everything they knew behind in Moscow. All the irritations, struggles, and stumbles were worth it. As far as I am aware, my parents never regretted leaving nor considered moving back (not that we had that option anyway).
Almost twenty years later, we are fully integrated into American society. My family and I have adopted all of its quirks, positives, and some of the negatives (lord, how I do love Cheetos). We are naturalized citizens, registered voters, and proud contributors to the economy (no, I don’t make much money, but I do spend a lot of it). I have never once felt sad for having left Moscow, never experienced regret. Not until yesterday, that is, when I received a notice for jury duty. For June 5. For the same day as the commencement and hooding ceremony that will harness all the pomp and circumstance that Harvard is capable of in order to put an official and florid end to my seven years in grad school. I was not a happy camper. All of a sudden, having registered to vote seemed kinda dim of me in hindsight.
So I exaggerate.
I didn’t regret anything, but I was plenty frustrated. I spent a day gearing up for a fight with the Massachusetts jury service. I was going to go in guns blazing into the phone call, trying to weasel my way into a different day to serve. The fight was going to go a little something like this: “Do what you will to me, arrest me if you have to (ok, maybe don’t arrest me) but I am not going to sit in a stuffy courtroom all day instead of walking in my own graduation. It is going to take an awful lot more than an arrest warrant to keep me away from JK Rowling. Please don’t tell her that though. That would be bad.”
But you know what? It wasn’t that bad. I explained that I had already postponed jury duty once (I think last time the date was right close to a committee meeting), that I was being awarded a PhD on June 5 and that, and that pleeeeeaaase help me, what do I doooooo? And you know, the man was supremely nice, congratulatory, and wonderfully calming. We happily negotiated another date for me to show up for jury duty. He did assure me that all kinds of doctors are accepted to serve on juries. Oh good. I was worried there for a second.
(that, and the fact that I cross my sevens).
Eh… does that make me Russian/Jewish too?
Oops. That should have included (that, and the fact that I cross my sevens)
I’m a seven crosser too – thought it looked interesting in French classes at school and never lost it.
(Sorry, Anna, didn’t mean to hijack your interesting post, but Richard started it too. I’ve often wondered, as someone who doesn’t get paid if I don’t do the work, whether I would attempt to get out of jury duty, but I’m yet to be called. I’d like to do it – but would worry about the finances.)
What’s so bad about jury duty? Like voting, it is the little bit we can contribute as individuals to keep aspects of our society that we like running smoothly. I’ve only been called twice. Neither was a murder trial. As long as the system is flexible enough to arrange alternative dates…
I have Russian/Jewish ancestry, and I also cross my sevens. But, like Brian, I think I picked up this habit from French classes at school. My kids find it most confusing, but they haven’t studied much French yet.
Myth busted!
You are so lucky to have J K Rowling coming to speak at your ceremony, how wonderful! Please write and tell us about it.
(For one moment there, when reading your post, I thought you were referring to being called for jury service in the plagiarism case she is bringing in NY — but glad to see that it is a mistake, and her presence will be for a much happier occasion.)
Richard – I think crossing my sevens is a tip-off to European ancestry. Certainly nothing specific to Russia. To be honest, I think I forced myself to cross my sevens once I started working in labs. It helps prevent all sorts of mix-ups.
Brian – I thought people in the UK cross their sevens, no? I didn’t realize it was specific to France. The finances of jury duty are pretty brutal in the States. I think they compensate you minimum wage if you are held up in a prolonged trial, but I could be making that up.
Heather – I absolutely agree with you. There is utterly nothing wrong with jury duty! It’s definitely a good thing, especially when the juror is lacking obvious prejudices and preconceived notions (just really hoping that applies to me. Not sure though). Jury duty that falls on top of my commencement is a different story, one that I do have a problem with. I actually rescheduled it for next week. I am really curious to see how it is. Most of my friends somehow turned out to be attorneys and I am looking forward to getting a glimpse at their world. I am just relieved that I don’t have to sacrifice graduation for it. They were very accommodating.
Henry – Again, I don’t get it. You mean people in the UK aren’t taught to cross their sevens normally? I am now starting to doubt my own seven-crossing roots. I too took French in high school. This is starting to sound like a world-wide reprogramming effort on the part of the French.
Maxine – I am thrilled that she will be coming to speak. Absolutely thrilled. I will take as many photos as I can during her talk. I am sure the whole speech will be up on YouTube in no time. I don’t think they would ever let me sit on her trial though… not once I told them I would give the woman a spare kidney if she asked for it.
People in the UK are NOT taught to cross sevens. In Australia it seems to be expressly forbidden at school, although I encourage my two to ignore the prison guards.
I learned it while living in Germany.
Crossing sevens is European, but dating from the time before the UK was in Europe. When I was at school, “seven crossing” was always referred to as “French”. However, I personally have always done it, to clearly distinguish from “one”. There may be other UK mavericks like myself, but in the main, crossing sevens is definitely a “mainland continental” European habit and not a “pan European” habit.
And if JKR needs a second kidney she can have mine by the way ;-)
Stopped crossing my sevens after I moved to the states because people kept thinking it’s either an F or a 4. Now each time I’m in Germany, people think my seven is a one, and my one is just a divider or so. When I see crossed sevens I get nostalgic, much like when I surprisingly come across A4 paper… or two-hole punches! Ah, the small differences ;-)
I have reached the grand old age of 46 and have never yet been asked to serve on a jury. Perhaps that will change when they bring back the possibility of hanging for the crime of being a politically correct human resources droid in a built-up area. Either that, or transportation to Australia. On the other hand …
I cross my sevens (I actually just had to try writing a phone number to see if I did), but I don’t remember if that’s something I learned in school in Holland, or just picked up myself. I taught myself to write before we officially learned it in grade 1, and then spent grade 2-3 and most of grade 4 at an American school abroad, and came back to Holland obviously already capable of writing sevens.
Huh. I never thought about it. People never said anything about it either. Now I’m all self-conscious about writing sevens. 7! 7? 77.
I’ve been asked twice. I was excused the first time as I was 8 months 4 weeks pregnant. (In fact it would have been OK as the jury service is for 2 weeks and the baby was a 43 week-er). The second time I did the service and it was quite eye-opening. All the witnesses gave contradictory statements, but the only one that the rest of the jury fully believed was the scientist. Who was extremely boring. But my fellow-jurists were riveted by his descriptions of various aspects of forensic analysis and believed every word implicitly. The police, accused and sundry witnesses were all treated with a large degree of scepticism.
I learned to cross my sevens when on a French exchange at
HighGrammar School. Another anglicism, in my old town High Schools were for girls and Grammar Schools were for boys. Where I live now there are Grammar Schhols for both boys and girls (either separately or together) and a High School is where you go to if you don’t get in to a Grammar School. Isn’t life confusing.However, I have no idea where I got the habit of crossing my Zeds.
I cross my 7s and my zs too, but I’ve no idea why. My parents are both French teachers if that helps.
I was asked to do jury duty in Glasgow during the final few months of my PhD. My supervisor wrote a letter to get me out of it. I’m not a Canadian citizen yet, but I’m sure I’ll be called soon after I pass the test and sing the anthem. I think it would be a very interesting experience, but only if it’s a short trial. The thought of getting caught up in a 4-month long event scares me silly.
I skimmed the comments earlier and got completely the wrong end of the stick! I interpreted Henry’s remark – I have Russian/Jewish ancestry, and I also cross my sevens – as meaning that ‘crossing sevens’ was some arcane Russian/Jewish ritual, akin to crossing yourself when entering a Catholic Church…
Only belatedly did I catch the true meaning and it reminded me of an incident at the end of my time as a postdoc at the EMBL in Grenoble that taught me the perils of not crossing your sevens when in France. I placed a small ad to sell my aged Peugeot 104 hatchback for what I thought was the very reasonable price of 7000 francs (this was 1989). I was delighted to get lots of phone calls from people wanting to see the car. The very first guy who turned up for a test drive offered me 1000 francs on the spot. “Mais non,” I protested, “le prix, c’est sept mille!” He proceeded to show me the paper and the error of my un-crossing ways…
Anna: congrats on your graduation!
I cross my Z’s, but not my 7’s (but I had to check my writing to see if I did because I couldn’t remember). I picked it up at school (here in the greater Boston area), so as to avoid confusion between Z’s and 2’s.
I have been called for jury duty a few times but have never served on a jury. I think the conventional wisdom is that lawyers don’t want scientists on juries; they want people they can manipulate with rhetoric and emotion, not facts and logic.
One for Brian’s Ignobel I think.
We’ve got four categories:
Then correlate by career upbringing (geographically that is) (oh, and Russian/Jewish heritage) , sex and jury duty, summoned and served.
Richard – I am really surprised to hear that UK is not a seven-crossing country. I am even more surprised that Aussies are explicitly anti-seven crossing. Weird. It makes life in lab much less confusing.
Maxine – I am always happy to meet another Rowling-obsessive! I am impressed by her on many different levels and think she is overall wonderful. I wonder if Brits don’t seven-cross specifically to be anti-French. I may be reaching on that one.
Sabine – You can so easily tell where one is from by their handwriting. It’s funny that way. I think the way Americans write is generally confusing. Twos, ones, and sevens all look the same to me. I don’t like it and it’s a killer in lab. A4 paper is something I have never even seen. What is it used for? Used widely in Europe, I presume?
Henry – I hope you didn’t just jinx yourself by saying you haven’t yet been called to a jury. Chances are it wouldn’t be that bad… although the possibility of the trial dragging and dragging is making me anxious. I wonder, Would the court be less likely to take a PhD onto the jury? Maybe it would depend on the area of expertise.
Eva – Ha! Sorry to have made you twitch about your sevens. It’s weird how handwriting becomes so subconscious. What about your other numbers? Which culture won out? American or European?
Maxine – So interesting to hear you speak of how scientists are received by others. I have been thinking a lot about it – scientists are either all-knowing and flawless or unapproachable mumbo-jumbo spewers (depending on the cynicism of the person, I suppose). Either way, scientists are a species a part. At least in my experience.
Brian – I have never understood the benefits of separating the sexes during schooling. I always thought that the socialization one learns in school is almost as important as the actual learning. You don’t learn how to deal with the opposite sex in separated schools. I think the benefits are outweighed by the negatives. Whew. That was long winded. Sorry.
Cath – I am with you! A short trial could be fun and educational, anything longer is terrifying.
Stephen – That’s hilarious! Jewish ritual. We do have a lot of them, but crossing sevens (other other objects) isn’t one. This post did take a complete detour. More hilarious still is your car story! Small cultural differences have big impacts, eh? I never realized that.
David – That makes sense. I can see how someone with extensive training in analytical reasoning would have trouble being convinced by emotion. At least I hope that’s how I would feel on a jury.
Richard – What would be the read-out of this statistical analysis? Projected happiness? Publication record/success? Reasonable car resale value (Stephen!)
ADH capacity.
Alcohol DeHydrogenase?
Automatic Document Handler?
Adrenal something Hormone?
Why am I being slow on this? Not unusual, I suppose.
First guess was right :)
Anna – A4 paper is part of a series of paper sizes where the long:short sides are in the ratio of 1.414:1 (I should say square root of 2:1 but I can’t do symbols in this text). So if you fold a sheet of A4 paper into two, each half will have the same ratio and is the next size in the series – A5. A beautifully geometrical way to define sizes. If you really (and I warned you) want to know more, follow this link.
Yes the link is to Cambridge University Computer Laboratory – but does that really surprise you?
Richard – if alcohol processing capacity is the readout for the assay, we will have to include ethnic background. I hear that the lethal doses of alcohol for people of Slavic descent are much higher than those of other races/ethnicities. Yay for Slavs. I think.
Brian – Well, I did follow the link. I am now a little dorkier than I was 5 minutes ago, but much impressed. I had no idea that so much elegance could shine through a sheet of paper. It’s really a very cool design. Wish I could find a use for it.
I wonder, Would the court be less likely to take a PhD onto the jury? Maybe it would depend on the area of expertise.
Having a Ph.D. can get you into trouble. There I was, on a plane on the tarmac at Mexico City, on the way back to London. It was a 747 (sevens crossed? Not in this case) and I was in the middle seat of a row of five, jut behind the bulkhead. No legroom at all. To my left was a young couple with a screaming baby on their laps. Ah, well, I thought, the next 11 hours is something I’ll just have to get through. It can’t possibly get any worse.
It did.
A stewardess came through the cabin. “Dr Gee? Dr Gee?” she inquired. Oh, rats, I thought – the pilot is having a coronary and they want me to revive him. I was steeling myself to say that the subjects of my doctorate had been dead for a minimum of 10,000 years when the stewardess said -
“Ah, Dr Gee – would you like to sit over here so this couple [the folks with the baby] can have that seat?”
She steered me to a window seat next to a very charming lady classical guitarist from Germany who’d just finished a Mexican tour.
So it turned out OK in the end.
They do say that the biggest flaw of the Western justice system is that your fate is in the hands of a group of people who were too stupid to get out of jury duty.
Henry, I used to work with an MD who was doing a PhD. The reason he’d give when asked why anyone would do such a thing was that he could then say “sorry, it’s a PhD” when he was approached for assistance on long flights.
“I wonder if Brits don’t seven-cross specifically to be anti-French.” I think there could well be some truth in that theory, Anna. I adore the French, of course, especially their cheese, I add hastily as a caveat.
Just like Stephen, it took me a few comments to understand seven crossing. I actually stopped doing it after living in Boston for a few years.
Being an MD, I was asked to help twice on long-distance flights. And I was theatre doctor in Berlin for a few years. Free tickets for two, but you are asked if something happens (which never did). One of my first shows was La Bohème, which made me consider for a moment to jump on stage and help Mimi.
Henry – You know, I am so that girl. I am the girl always sitting next to the screaming – and occasionally puking – baby (I do NOT get on well with babies) on the airplane. Every freakin’ time. It’s insane. Your cautionary tale has hit its mark. I will not be checking the “Dr” box before my name on a plane ticket. I couldn’t help anyone in need. Not even if they had herpes!
Cath – I did have that same thought. Seems like the only people that could easily stroll into jury duty have nothing more important to do (so not true, I know). My over active imagination prevented me from skipping the thing out right. I really don’t think the food in prison will be very good.
Maxine – There may be minor reasons to dislike the French (the ridiculous number of smokers in the country is one), but their food is beyond reproach. I think my last meal on this Earth (or death row wish?) would be a baguette, cheese, and some nice red wine.
Martin – You should have done it! Started an entire genre of improv opera, even! Not really. What a brilliant compromise – medical expertise for theatre tickets. Were the cases on the plane serious? It’s strange how as an MD, you are considered to be always on the job, always available.
I don’t know why, but when I see an uncrossed seven I just have to cross it. An uncrossed seven looks … well … undressed. So sue me.
I leave the on-stage performance to my little sister who is an opera singer. And the medical situations on the plane were luckily not serious – no heart attacks or childbirths. It was just that awkward unexpected moment when you here the announcement. I always thought that this happens only in movies.
Hi Anna,
Yeah, as Brian said above, A4 is the same as the international standard which is pretty much used everywhere except in North America it seems. A4 is a bit longer and less wide than letter, but it’s about the same size. It can be very annoying though if you have a pdf or ps file that is formatted for the wrong paper size and you can’t anywhere buy the papersize you need. I’d really wish that North America would use the international standard esp. in the USA – and use Celsius instead of Fahrenheit, litres instead of gallons, kilometres instead of miles, grams instead of ounces, kilograms instead of pounds and other deviation from international units.
Another tidbit about the A4 format: A0, the largest format in the A series, is exactly 1 square meter in area. Which makes the area of A4 one 16th of a square meter. Just in case anybody wanted to know.
The metric system makes so much more sense to me, even after 20 years in the US. I will never understand what an inch is, much less a mile. Why does a mile have a seemingly random number of feet? I like the regularity of the metric system. It just makes sense. So does the A4 paper, now that I know what it is. There is logic to it. There is no logic to a 12 inch foot. I don’t get it. If I haven’t gotten it yet, I may never get it.
Anna-
Yet another 7 and Z crosser- my mother is german and we lived 3 years there when I was younger- guess I just never got out of the 7 crossing habit…
and Hey Martin!
I am an opportunistic crosser: I do it when I can, sometimes successfully sometimes not. Both sevens and Zs. My father was in the printing business so I knew a lot about paper formats from a very early age and love the A system. And I love the SI system. And I was never called for jury duty in the 10 years since I became a US citizen. And my Slavic/Jewish beackground is far too obvious to even attempt to hide.
That “beackground” was on purpose, it is my beak-like nose revealing my background.
Oh Bora, I hope you didn’t just jinx yourself with the jury duty business. I will keep my fingers crossed for you (not that it’s so horrible, but it is an inconvenience). Beackground! Hee. I have got one of those too.
Pray that Bora and I don’t get called to serve on the same jury. We’d only be tempted to blog about the experience (with massive links to each other’s blogs) thus undermining the judicial system and the course of western civilzation.
I am afraid you are too late for the undermining, Henry. After the OJ Simpson verdict, there is nothing left of the judicial system to undermine. That is my personal opinion.
Henry, it’s a deal. We’ll liveblog it!
Unfortunately there are far worse instances of undermining the Judicial system than the OJ verdict.
Anna, there is indeed logic in 12 inches to a foot system. Just think that body parts were used as units of measurement, therefore the name ‘foot’. An inch roughly corresponds to a knuckle of a finger, a yard to the distance between one’s arms outstretched.
Interestingly, such systems are common to many languages (e.g., the Russian arshin, vershok).
Katya – There is clearly logic in the foot system, but no method in the madness. There is no system, no way to predict the next unit up. 1cm – 1dm – 1m – 1km… it all makes sense. I have no idea how many feet are in a mile. None. 5000 something? I haven’t heard arshin in a long time! Probably the last time I read Tolstoy, in fact!