Did anyone watch The Good Wife last week? The one that ended with a cheesy, fake public service announcement about sexual harassment, complete with 90’s style sound effects? Well despite the intentionally low production values, it took Alex and me a few moments to figure out if this was part of the show, or real. And anyone who has ever watched any programming on AFN knows the reason why – the constant barrage of public service announcements.

The American Forces Network, or AFN, gives us access to American programming while we’re overseas. This is particularly nice since we live in a country where streaming anything over the internet is almost impossible. Even though we only get 3 channels (and our jealous of certain co-workers who get 10), we appreciate that we get some prime time programming and can count on having access to major sporting events.

Sometimes we question AFN’s programming choices (Big Brother three times per week? The Buffalo Bills every Sunday?) but ask anyone what they think about AFN and the first thing they’ll mention will be the PSA’s. You see, instead of commercials, we get PSA’s, mostly produced by the military, but sometimes by other groups.

So far we’ve learned:

• Shaking your baby is bad.
• You should never post personal information on the internet.
• Applying for citizenship for your baby is a long and complicated process.
• You should dress nicely when overseas so you make a good impression.
• Traffic and recycling laws are different all over the world.
• If you only have a limited about of time to use the internet at a library, write down all the things you want to do in advance so make the most of your time.
• Gary Sinise believes people might know him primarily from his musical endeavor, The Lt. Dan Band.

Because we get PSA’s instead of commercials, we’ve certainly learned a lot, but unfortunately, we have no idea what movies are playing.