Adventures in Guangzhou!

One of the biggest concerns in doing PiA is culture shock and readjustment to a foreign environment. While I had a few minor instances of increased frustration or homesickness during my first year, I don't think I ever went through something that you could really call culture shock. I didn't have too much time to consider it before I left, but I think that coming back is almost more difficult--something akin to reverse culture shock.

Reverse culture shock is a well documented condition, but one that may be overlooked by most. After all, you are returning to the familiar. There is no alien culture to acculturate to; there is no radically new milieu in which to experience. That is, not on the surface anyway. As I sat in the front of the car driving back into my hometown, I found myself staring out at the storefronts and street signs. It all looked more or less the same, but there were minor differences here and there. Was that sign always red? When did Subway put in a shop there? What happened to the bank? etc.

Despite the small changes, I almost feel as if the past 10 months was a dream. If I didn't have the pictures and emails and blog entries, I might be able to convince myself that it's all made-up. One of the difficulties in being home is seeing people who ask the obvious question, "How's China?" The problem is, how in the world do you answer that question? I remember back when I was in Israel for the first time, we were prepped on receiving this sort of question. What they told us was that it's impossible to convey all your thoughts and feelings from the entire abroad experience; therefore, instead of trying to answer the question with an all-encompassing response, just try to pick one small vignette in which to share or one highlight. This seemed like good advice once again, but I find it hard to even pick a highlight or a single story.

The whole thing is great, interesting, strange, boring, exciting, challenging, easy, informative, predictable, and unreliable all at the same time. Thus, in true China form, it's one big contradiction. At this point it's comforting to know that I will be going back so soon, in order to gain more knowledge and experience. Perhaps that will enable me to formulate a better response to that question, "How's China?"

Stepping off the plane in Detroit on my connecting flight, I had a few observations right off the bat-- first, people in America are overweight. My students used to make comments like this and I would go out of my way to say they were wrong, but they might just be on to something! Walking around the airport, it looked like everybody was carrying around quite a bit of added weight. Not that everybody was obese, just not quite as fit or as thin as in China. I ascribe that 100% to diet and exercise. Most Chinese people eat better and bicycle/walk much more than the average joe in America. Second, I felt very short. Though I never felt really tall in China, I felt as if everybody was towering over me in Detroit. I'm not quite sure what accounts for this, but there's nobody in the states that would try to convince me to play center on the basketball court. Third, America is incredibly diverse. I guess I just got used to staring at predominantly Han-Chinese faces for 10 months and forgot that there are more heterogenous societies out there. As such, nobody was staring at me as I walked by. That may have been the biggest shock of all--I was back to being a dime a dozen! As I sat down in the airport cafe to have only my 2nd hamburger in the last 10 months, I began to think about a few other things.

There are several situations from the past in which I had to say goodbye to people and make a major transition in life (e.g. graduating high school or college, moving to China, etc.). However, I can't recall a single instance in which I had to say goodbye to a number of people who were leaving while I was actually going to return. Usually everybody was moving on so there was a sense of accomplishment or excitement for the next step, of sorts. However this time, I had to say goodbye to a number of good friends, but yet I'm going to be right back in a few months. Guangzhou is going to be amazingly different when I return in August and once again I have no idea what to expect. The first time 'round, I expected it to be difficult; to be a strange time living experience. This time? I hope to foster closer ties and relationships with my coworkers. I hope to my Chinese drastically improves. I hope to discover all the sights that aren't in the guidebook. But will it work out this way? Who knows.

As I spend the next couple of weeks spending time with family and seeing friends around the eastern seaboard, I hope to record a few more of my thoughts about this short intermission from China.