the New Pantagruel: Hymns in the Whorehouse: “After talking for a while she got around to repeating one of the most tired of mantras of the global economy, “Well, it is a small world after all.” I would not deny that her world was small. She could just as well live in France as in England, the U.S. as in China. Her day to day life would change little from place to place. There are generally the same sorts of people in each city, doing the same sorts of business, with the same sorts of shopping, even the exact same restaurants. You can go to Starbucks in London, order a caramel macchiato, and forget that it isn’t in Chicago except for the coins one gets in change. But to imagine that this facade of consumption is somehow the reality of a place is to miss something fundamental.”