On vacation with Gil’s family at a resort in San Diego
and then at a horse ranch,
on vacation with my family at Bass Lake,
berry picking.
Tag: Home Assignment Page 8 of 15
cul·ture shock
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Noun
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Reflections from a Week in Culture Shock
Yeah, you have some crime. But you don’t need bars on your windows, a wall around your house, and a private security company to keep you safe. You can walk down the street with a purse on your arm and not worry about it being grabbed by someone in a moving car. You can leave chairs on the sidewalk on the 4th of July, and no one takes them.
You can worship who you want, when you want, and where you want. You can even convert to a different religion if you want to, and practically no one will care. You certainly won’t be arrested for it.
Your stores are stuffed with food, and never run out. If they happen to run out of the exact flavor of cream cheese that you want, there are big apologies, and you just go to a different store. You even are given the luxury of worrying about whether or not something is “organic” or “genetically modified.” And if you are down on your luck, there are thousands of churches or food banks or welfare offices ready and waiting to pass out food for free.
When a woman goes into labor, sometimes you worry about the baby, but you hardly ever worry about the mom. A baby that dies in childbirth is an epic tragedy (as it should be), so much so that even strangers on Facebook send you their condolences. Losing a child (or two, or three) is not normal life for you. You don’t think about how you’re just happy to have survived childbirth yourself.
You have clean drinking water that comes out of every tap in your house. You don’t have to walk five miles to find water that’s full of cholera. In fact, you are even given the luxury of not liking the taste of that water, so you spend your money on water in bottles.
Your thrift stores are given so many of your cast-off clothes that they are only able to sell a small portion. Your family lives in an entire house, not just one room in a house. And even then, you have to rent a storage unit because you can’t fit all of your stuff into it.
Your children’s childhoods are valued. You have parks everywhere with colorful slides and Children’s Museums and kids’ menus at restaurants and swimming pools in your backyard. They are not expected, or needed, to haul water or dig farms when they are six years old.
It is assumed your children will be part of the 7% of the world with a college degree. They have one teacher to 30 children, instead of one teacher to 100 children. They have books and markers and colorful room decorations. Each child has his own desk with his name on it, instead of three children crammed onto one desk. This education is free, and if you are not satisfied with it, you are given the freedom to educate them yourself, at home–and you won’t be arrested for it.
If your child is born with a cleft pallet, there is no question of whether it will be fixed. You don’t worry about polio or malaria or cholera. You have a fair amount of confidence that your child will live until adulthood. If your child is bit by a snake or breaks a leg, you call a number and an emergency vehicle will be at your door in five minutes. You don’t have to worry about how you will get your child (without a car) to a hospital (which may or may not have medicine that day) 50 miles away.
If you are pulled over by police, you are not expected to bribe them. Most of the time, you believe that the police are actually there to serve you and protect you, not rob you or rape you. If your house catches on fire, you are not forced to stand and watch it burn; you simply call a number and a fire truck will be there in five minutes.
For the most part, you know your taxes are not lining the pockets of your politicians. You get roads and schools and libraries. It is not an assumption that your elections are rigged, and the losing party will not start a riot that kills hundreds of people. Your government has checks and balances, and you are not ruled by a ruthless dictator who feeds people to his crocodiles for fun.
Middle Class America, I know your lives aren’t perfect.
But to whom much has been given, much will be expected.
Hi.
My name is Amy.
I am coming to a church or a neighborhood or a coffee shop near you.
For the first time in 8 years, I’m going to have the time to do more than just hug you or shake your hand or comment on how much your kids have grown.
I’m really, really excited about this. But can I tell you a secret? I’m also pretty nervous.
I am an introvert and initiating relationships is hard for me. I’ve come a loooong way since high school, when practically everyone intimidated me. The nature of my job has forced me to get better at initiating conversations. And here in Tanzania, I’m pretty good at it by now, because I’ve lived here a long time and I am comfortable here.
But the thought of living in America and getting to know American people? Kind of scary for me.
Because I know I will be the oddball. I don’t know anything about online banking or cell phone plans or what kids’ programs are offered at the YMCA. I’m terrible with fashion and make-up and making myself look American. I feel strange using credit cards instead of cash and I haven’t pumped my own gas in years.
And I know from past trips home that people don’t often really know what to do with me. I’m not sure if it’s because I am an oddball, or if it’s because I am a missionary and therefore not really human.
So can I just get a couple things out in the open right now?
I want to be your friend. Promise. And I am really going to make the effort, but if there are times when you are wondering whether or not I want to be invited to that women’s event or baby shower or scrapbooking party or whatever, let me tell you this now: YES, I want to come.
I want to connect with you. We are missionaries to Tanzania, but we are not immigrants to Tanzania. There is a big difference, because it means that California still is our home and we want to maintain a connection there.
I love to talk about Africa. But sometimes people seem intimidated to ask us anything about it. I think that’s because they don’t want to seem ignorant or they don’t want to admit that they actually haven’t been reading our email updates. But seriously, that’s okay with us. I don’t remember everything from your Christmas letters. I’ll probably ask you for the names of your kids more than once. We don’t expect you to remember everything about us either.
I love talking to kids about Africa, because they have no inhibitions. They ask, Do you live with lions? We love those questions. Adults think it, but they don’t ask it. Go ahead and ask. We won’t think you’re stupid.
And if you don’t want to talk about Africa, I’m okay with that too. I just want to get to know you. I’ve watched all the seasons of Downton Abbey and The Office and Modern Family. I follow U.S. news and politics, so we can talk about those things. Honestly, as I think about these last few years, the hardest part has simply been being a mom to small children. I’ve got 16 years of Africa stuffed inside me, so I know that makes me different. But we probably have more in common than you think.
So….will you be my friend?
Thanks. Can’t wait to hang out with you.
Love,
Amy
I dream of hugging my Daddy again, and chatting with my mom for an hour after breakfast. I can’t wait to experience winter and spring with my children, and to go for long quiet walks in the park.
I want to order pizza and have it delivered to my door when I don’t feel like cooking. I want a break from ticks and cockroaches and mosquitoes. I want to be able to drive a car without that tense feeling in my stomach.
I long to sing in the churches that are full of my history and to ride bikes with my children on the same street where I used to ride bikes. I want kitchen drawers that don’t have to be yanked open so hard that I fall backwards and I want to celebrate Independence Day and Thanksgiving and Memorial Day in the right country.
Yet.
I will miss how the Indian Ocean sparkles when I walk to school. I will miss the dirt on my feet that represents the grit and the sweat and the earthiness of a life that has not been paved over. I will miss the way my children are entertained by so little and the frozen juice boxes they beg for almost every day after school. I will miss being Mrs. Medina to hundreds of children who I have watched grow.
I don’t know how I will live a year without my soul sisters, who are knit together in my heart and have held me up through the sweat and the dust. Here, I am understood. I am losing all of my work, all of my jobs and tasks and my identity, and even my roles of wife and mom are going to change completely as I take on new work, new routines.
And I don’t know who I will be, because Africa and HOPAC have been my life for 10 years.
The emotions of excitement and anticipation and loss and stress and grief and transition and change all clash together in my heart.
Too much feeling; just too much.
My brain is tired, and often I just go numb.
But I know it has an end, and I know from experience that when I get on the plane, everything is okay. Because I have been at this place before, and that makes it easier.
And He is there, and I am His.
He will never leave me, even to the ends of the earth.