I started participating in the BloggingAbroad.org Re-Entry Blog Challenge a couple of weeks ago. It's purpose is two-fold: 1) to provide insights for people who are wondering what it's like to return home after having spent time abroad, and 2) to provide a space for those who have been abroad to process their experience returning home. You can read my first post here. This iteration of the challenge is about five things that really stood out after I returned home. The things I outline below are the first ones I either wrote in my journal or remember talking about with others.
1. Being able to understand (virtually) everything people around me were saying.
While many people in my village in South Africa spoke English, it was common that people would use their home language when having casual conversation or participating in a meeting. With my limited ability to speak isiZulu, I found myself often giving up trying to translate what felt like rapid isiZulu. The conversation would fade into other ambient sounds.
When I returned to the US, I had a layover in Chicago where I spent time with a couple of friends. We went to dinner to grab some Chicago-style, deep dish pizza, which I had been craving for a long time. While were at dinner, I couldn't help by notice my attention straying from our table to the tables around us. I also noticed I was having a hard time focusing on any one particular table. This is when I donned on me that I could understand everything that was being said around me! For the first time in over two years, I could understand everything because everyone was speaking English. And instead of tuning out the conversations, I found that I wanted to tune in. I'm not one for eavesdropping, but now I wanted to listen in simply because of the novelty that I could.
This renewed sense of understanding was fun and exciting at first, but then the overwhelm creeped in because being able to understand everything meant I could understand everything. I was bombarded. I felt my energy being scattered trying to keep up with all of the conversations. Over time, thankfully, I have learned to focus my attention again and now have control of when I tune in, tune out, and choose when I engage. I feel like one of the X-men learning how to control her/his superpower.
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| Xavier Teaching Erik (Magneto) to Control His Superpower |
2. Idioms are confusing.
Idiom. noun. a group of words established by usage as having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words (e.g., rain cats and dogs, see the light). (Google search).
I admit I used idioms while I was in South Africa; especially when I first arrived. However, as time progressed, I used them less and less because it took more time explaining what they meant instead of using language that was more direct and literal.
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| Why would the cat be there in the first place? |
The first time I experienced hearing an idiom in the US was in Chicago during the layover. My friend picked me up from the airport and we got into a conversation about writing, and he told me a story about a time his mom "tore apart" a story he had written. When he said this, my mind immediately starting picturing his mom literally tearing apart his story; little bits of paper flying everywhere. It took me a minute to realize I had this image, so I replayed what he said again in my mind and it was then I recognized that he meant his mom edited his story and, by the combination of the words he used, probably meant there were a lot of edits. I laughed; mostly at myself for the misunderstanding and a little because it made me wonder if this was what South Africans had experienced when I used idioms.
3. Signage.
Signs were (and are) everywhere in the US. I mentioned bombardment above about being able to hear English everywhere. Signs meant I could see English everywhere. This was a whole other level of stimulation. I remember walking through the airports in Chicago and Cleveland staring at various signs trying to figure out where to go and not quite understanding because some of the signs either felt like they were competing against each other or I was supposed to infer a larger meaning (e.g. a sign pointing down and left meant I was supposed to go down a flight of stairs to the left of the sign - go figure!)
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| Hmmm... What is one to do? |
When I thought signs at the airport were challenging enough, I was met with street signs. Stop, go, one-way, yield, street names, temporary parking only, and on and on. There were street signs in South Africa, but not nearly as many, and, besides, most of the time I was a passenger riding in a khumbi (i.e. taxi) so I didn't pay much attention. Thankfully, the worst that resulted from reading/interpreting all of these signs was a parking ticket. I got one for parking on the side of the street during the time it was designated for street cleaning. And here I thought I was lucky to get such a good spot!
4. Options.
I had heard from many Returned Peace Corps Volunteers that the number of options at the grocery store could be overwhelming. Knowing this and experiencing it proved to be very different things. My first time experiencing it was at the grocery store was with my mom and sister. We were at the deli counter. I was excited to pick out meats and cheeses I hadn't had since I left. After a couple of minutes of staring at the case, I turned back to my mom and sister who were standing next to the cart and asked if one of them could help me. I told them I wanted turkey and cheddar, but I couldn't choose which one. There were too many choices: smoked turkey, mesquite smoked turkey, honey turkey, peppered turkey, and that didn't get into the different brands, and that was just the turkey! While was standing at the case, my eyes kept darting from one to the next and it was making me feel anxious. The rest of the time in the grocery store continued in the same vein - me telling them what I wanted to eat and one of them picking out what they thought was best.
Barry Schwartz has a book about the overwhelm felt by having too many options called The Paradox of Choice. You can also watch his Ted Talk to get a sense of his argument:
5. Pace of life, conversation, thinking.
Re-introducing myself to the pace of life in the US wasn't a new phenomenon having experienced it once before after coming back from a study abroad in Ecuador. (Oh, how I missed siestas when I came back!) I guess the hard part this time was my attempt at trying to hold onto the pace of South African life. Asking people, "Unjani?" (How are you?) and meaning it. The answer to this question varied depending where I was along Michelle's and my road trip from the South to the Midwest to the Pacific Northwest, which in turn denoted the amount of time someone was willing to give us. Even moreso was the pace of the conversation - faster, slower, somewhere in the middle. I had to tune my ears differently depending on a person's pace of speech. I often found myself at least a couple of seconds behind on jokes and it was worse for sarcasm (another form of using words beyond a literal meaning; see above for idioms).
Re-introducing myself to the pace of life in the US wasn't a new phenomenon having experienced it once before after coming back from a study abroad in Ecuador. (Oh, how I missed siestas when I came back!) I guess the hard part this time was my attempt at trying to hold onto the pace of South African life. Asking people, "Unjani?" (How are you?) and meaning it. The answer to this question varied depending where I was along Michelle's and my road trip from the South to the Midwest to the Pacific Northwest, which in turn denoted the amount of time someone was willing to give us. Even moreso was the pace of the conversation - faster, slower, somewhere in the middle. I had to tune my ears differently depending on a person's pace of speech. I often found myself at least a couple of seconds behind on jokes and it was worse for sarcasm (another form of using words beyond a literal meaning; see above for idioms).
Even harder still was the pace at which people seemed to be thinking. I guess these could have been instances of me comparing my inside to other people's outsides, but I felt like I was thinking more slowly! I felt like all of what my brain had coming in was making it harder to produce a response that matched the quickness of others. This feeling happened in waves. The first wave was during our road trip, adjusting to the varied conversations and interactions with family and friends. The second occurred when I arrived in Seattle, getting settled into our new home and meeting new people. The third wave, and perhaps the hardest one, was at work. Conversations seemed to happen so fast, with topics passing in what felt like the blink of an eye. Moments to make decisions came quickly and I struggled under the pressure of deciding and trying to doing so while feeling informed. I'm still feeling this effect, but it's getting easier. I'm also getting better at asking for time to think.
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| Missing My Hammock Back in Manguzi |
This post is part of BloggingAbroad.org's Re-Entry Blog Challenge.
