My phone rings as I’m heading out of the door from work to home on Friday. I pull the phone out of my jeans and look at the name on the screen; its L. I answer. L asks, “Can you pick up some things at the store on your way home please? We need some cheese, milk, oranges, and some yogurt for tomorrow.” I agree to pick the things up and say the normal, “love yous” etc. and hang up. On the way home through the normal thirty minute commute I notice the other drivers going to their destinations. We’re all stopped together, going the same direction yet all to different destinations. The blonde in the car in the next to me is talking on her phone and drinking occasionally from her McDonald’s cup. The Jeep in front of me has a large dent in its right rear bumper, twisting it’s six character license plate ever so slightly. I continue on and exit the freeway at my normal exit on the right. Stopping at the stop light, as I always do, I turn left and then quickly right after the first light and then right again into the Target parking lot. I enter the store, and head around the store grabbing all the items. It’s easy because I recognize the items, the labels and know my way around the store. The entire trip to the store extended my normal commute time an extra twenty minutes or so.
It all seems so real. Yet that was some time ago. Here we are, L and I, in a new country – Germany – where I recognize little both in physical form and in writing.
When I was in the Navy some time ago I used to lament that we didn’t have any carpet when I’d go to a friend’s house off ship. Somehow having carpet was one of those things you failed to appreciate until it wasn’t there. It’s an odd thing; appreciation.
So, Germany. I don’t speak the language. I can hardly understand most things (but am catching on quickly – by my estimation). We’ve been here for nearly a month and will be here for possibly 23 more months. For me it’s a major transition. As I highlighted in my opening statement there were lots of little things that I came to appreciate and failed to notice. Or perhaps it was familiarity with things – McDonald’s drive through, small license plates, super markets you recognize, that familiar route home, your own cell phone with your own pictures phone numbers etc., your own car, billboards in your “native” language etc. I could go on and on, but you get the point. All of those little things you become so familiar with at “home” add up quickly when they aren’t there anymore.
L says that I’m experiencing what’s known in anthropology as “culture shock”. Linky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_shock
Although I agree with her it’s good to put my feelings into my own words. The two biggest things I’m feeling are: Loss of purpose (since I’m unemployed), lack of importance (since I feel as if I have so little impact on the world here or the people I’m around – due to the language barrier).
I am NOT one of those people who gets attached to things easily. I tend to break off relations with people / things easily and adapt to change as it comes to me (at least that is what I think of myself). Whatever that’s due too in my past I feel that it’s made me a stronger more able-bodied person to travel the world and experience so many things without lamenting the losses of various relationships, places, and things. Yet despite that “positive” personality trait of mine I find myself thinking a great deal about my friends and the various places I’d come to find comfortable. I believe that within the next possible two years here in this foreign (yet familiar) land I’ll come to adopt many behaviors that mirror / model my life back home. They still have McDonald’s, Starbucks (with entire menus in English), etc.
I will use this blog is to funnel some of my “culture shock” into something creative. I’ll try to update it daily and take note of the little things that make the experience so valuable.
