Reverse Culture Shock?

As you know, I was home a few weeks ago. The truth is my biggest concern was reverse culture shock (seems it should have been the flight home). Anyway, you may be thinking, "you idiot....that only happens when you go to Africa and live with no indoor plumbing." But the "culture training" I took when I first moved here told me that it can be serious stuff. They had me all worried that when I returned tight roll jeans would be back in fashion and everyone would laugh at me because I still wore mine normally.

Fortunately (obviously), it wasn't that bad. I did find that I had a hard time figuring out the right balance of talking normal (gossip) and about talking about my experiences in London and throughout Europe. For example, I quickly found that explaining my struggle to figure out what is REALLY in American cheese caused a my friend's eyes to glaze over as if I was talking about computer science. This was at one point very important to me because I had to figure out what kind of cheese to buy instead of American. But clearly it isn't important to anyone else.

And that's the point. Most of my days are spent in a city very similar to NYC doing a job extremely similar to my old job, but the small differences had nearly consumed my life. I was just starting to get over my obsession with these differences when I flew back to the States and noticed these things all over again.

People were walking on the right instead of the left. There were 25 cent coins. It sounded stupid if I said "cheers" when someone held the door for me. I had to tip bartenders again, but couldn't remember if I'm supposed to tip a private bus driver (I didn't).

Clearly none of these things are as bad as when my friend Rob came back from Afghanistan and marveled at the efficiency of trains and the informed conversations people were having about politics.

However, on the other side was the fact that I could hang out with people who actually knew me and that I was truly comfortable with. One of my other worries was that I would be back with my real friends and family and not want to leave again. This also turned out to not be as bad as I feared, though there are definitely days when I wish I could just call up a few of my friends and meet up somewhere to chat about old times.

I will be seeing everyone soon though. Tristan is coming to London for Thanksgiving weekend to enjoy my delicious cooking. I'll be back home in Dec for 3 weeks over Christmas/New Years. Tom is coming skiing with me and friends in France in late January. And I think my brothers are visiting in Feb! Phew!

Anyway, just something I've been thinking about since my trip. I'm still nervous that when I move back to the US I'll have all kinds of culture shock issues, but nothing that a few glasses of wine won't sort out.

Cheers,
Dan