I was warned about culture shock. It apparently is enough of a problem that it has been dissected and classified in four stages: honeymoon, negotiation, adjustment and mastery. I would imagine it comes as no surprise to anyone that relocating requires a bit of effort and will be met with obstacles and difficulties. Change is a wildly terrifying thing, something that I, for one, skirt around to avoid unnecessary complications. I initially didn’t want to deal with the difficulty of going abroad—speaking a foreign language, possibly being out of place or unhappy for 6 months of my life, not settling into the lifestyle. Yet, here I am, in Sevilla and reconditioning myself daily to the reality of my life here. I would be lying if I said it gets easier and easier to remember each morning that I will wake up to Spanish being spoken around me. The language immersion by far tests me most.
Last week, when I went to sign up at a dance studio, the receptionist asked me to write down mi nombre. I have been here almost four months now, and have taken Spanish for 7 long years. —¿Mi nombre? Let me just get my phone out. I have a hard time remembering it sometimes so I have it stored in my contacts list. The woman looked at me as if I were crazy. My brain began to reprocess rapid-fire, wondering where I had gone wrong. Then it occurred to me that I had forgotten and mistaken one of the first words I had ever learned in Spanish I: the word for “name.” Why I thought giving her my phone number was the more important piece of information of the two, I do not know.
There are difficulties being abroad. There is no doubt about it. Some places, from what I understand, require more adjustment than others and perhaps more fortitude and courage. I think of my friends studying in Africa or India and cannot imagine what sorts of obstacles they have encountered. Or, I think of the Erasmus students here who sometimes arrive with zero background knowledge of the language but still manage to survive. I admire that gumption a great deal, but I cannot say that it lessens the degree of the difficulties I have faced.
What I have come to realize is that life, regardless of where it is led, is hard. People, regardless of where they are, have issues of all natures to overcome. The most complex aspect, though, is the way in which they are dealt with within a culture. I have had my days where all I want is a hug. I even had a day when I almost planned a 24-hour trip to another country just to see my roommate Hannah and perhaps recapture some of the comfort of known faces. Despite being in a foreign country, my day-to-day troubles are invariably familiar. The Georgetown administration without fail has continued to throw me some curveballs; I still struggle to convey what it is I really want to say to my parents; there is drama, there is confusion, there is sometimes even sadness. At the end of the day, at the end of those four stages of culture shock, there is mastery, or at least in the sense that a feeling of normalcy descends.
You can come to a point where your life is actually no different, despite your location. Perhaps, you can even discover different and more successful means of coping with whatever plagues you. What is important to realize is that no matter the culture, oftentimes the values are the same even if the symbols and representations are quite different. My new friend at a tapas bar next door, Esther, brought me an extra plate of pimientos fritos at dinner because she knows, after two visits, that I love them. She just wanted to do something nice. I have realized what is most about being bombarded by a different culture and any obstacle, really: that people are there to help you wade it out, no matter how corny or deceivingly simple of a concept that is. It may be over an ice cream cone at Rayas, in a Skype session to avoid using saldo (phone credit balance) or even on a set of swings at María Luisa. I, at least, count myself lucky to be surrounded by people who cushion the blow of any culture shock, whether they are physically here in Spain or an ocean away.
