Lessons from Cartagena Pizza

I've heard from some of my U.S. friends living here, "There is no good pizza here in Cartagena." I decided to try it anyway, and I love it, which made me realize two things; first, just because someone doesn't like something, doesn't mean it's bad, second, the pizza here is phenomenal, it is just not New York City style pizza. The pizza here is the same as Italian pizza from Italy.
I have had pizza both in NYC and in different cities in Italy. I enjoy both types of pizza, the thicker crust of the Italian-American pizza and the thin, lightly topped, Italian-from Italy-pizza.
This idea of whether Cartagena pizza is good or bad is a metaphor for how (some) people from the States react to things that are different.
The pizza, restaurants, malls, entertainment and whatever is being compared to the States, is what it is here in Cartagena. It is not meant to be exactly the same as it is in New Jersey, California or North Dakota. It is meant to be from Cartagena, Colombia.
I don't understand the idea that the entire world needs to be one way. The world is rich because of its diversity. How incredibly boring would this planet be if every place we went, the food, the clothes, the shops, the people- were all exactly the same? Isn't that why we travel? To experience diversity, to experience how different cultures live? Why do we go somewhere and immediately compare it to what we left?
I understand that people get homesick and aren't comfortable with change and diversity. I have always thrived on diversity. Part of the reason is, how I grew up, I was always around others who were different than me. I never had the comfort of "sameness," even when visiting Egypt, my family there considered me an American.
Sometimes I want to say to someone who is criticizing Cartagena, "Hey, if you don't compare ...(the pizza,mall,restaurants etc.), you will see that what you dislike is actually fine." I don't because I don't think anything I will say will make a difference. If someone doesn't want to give the pizza here a chance they won't. I can only write my blog and let people know that, in my opinion, there is GREAT pizza in Cartagena, almost exactly like the pizza you will find in Florence, Italy.