Of Things I Miss About California

So I realize that it's been a little more than 3 months since I began my journey east of Eden (aka, California) and I am more than halfway through my abroad experience. To honor that, and to combat the bouts of homesickness, I would like to reflect on things that I miss about California:

1) The Beach
Living in SoCal is worth the immense heat, the smog, the traffic, and the slightly cranky people if only for one thing: the beach. You are not sunbathing until you are laying on golden sand, lulled by the sounds of the ocean waves, and the delicious California sun that would almost threaten to burn you to a crisp if you're not careful. You do not get that feeling of tranquility while laying in the fields of Coventry

2) Free water at restaurants
As a student, I miss being able to save money by not ordering a drink and taking advantage of free water. Especially when in Europe, at 1.50-2 euros/pounds for water, the money adds up and 9 times out of 10, the water is sparking and therefore a bland imitation of soda.

3) Big portions at restaurant
Oh America, land of plenty, how I love you for overfeeding your children and with the price of one meal, actually providing us with the equivalent of two European meals.

4) The bag boy
Tesco's, your friendly British supermarket, do not provide bag boys. The problem with that is since people bag their own groceries, the lines end up moving at a snail's pace. Also, I'm lazy and I like someone else being there to make sure that my eggs don't squish my vegetables.

5) Easy Accessibility
I miss how close everything is, when I could have just walked 5 minutes and there would be a liquor store, or an In&Out nearby. At Warwick, good food is a 30 minute bus ride away and when you have to depend on the rarely punctual British public transportation system to get around, sometimes it's just better to heat something up in the microwave.

6) Close Proximity to Ethnic Food
I would kill for a bowl of phở, Korean BBQ, or even Pad Thai. And even more (which ties in to number 5), I miss having all of the above a mere 20 minute drive (or even less!) from my house. The fact that British food is bland just makes this feeling so much more poignant.

7) Street signs
I hate navigating in Europe, if only because you have to actively look for the streetname, which (unlike the US) are not on poles at the end of the street or overlooking the car lanes. Instead, it's on the end building on every street which are more often than not: small, hidden, scratched, smudged, otherwise unreadible or my personal favorite, absent.

8) Friendliness of the people
I miss going ointo a store and making conversation with a cashier or talking to a random stranger at the market while pondering over vegetables. Here (in Britain), people tend to keep to themselves, the cashiers don't talk to you, and the regular folks would sooner pretend you're invisible than say hi.

9) Cheap living
Somehow, two sweaters for 25 pounds does not beat 2 sweaters for $25. I cannot buy quality clothes for cheap, food for cheap, or gas for cheap (in comparison to the rest of Europe) . Instead, a t-shirt (made in India) is 10 pounds, food is imported and thus expensive, and gas...does not matter since I do not have a car. When the exchange rate goes down, mayble I'll change my mind about this point.

10) Double water faucets
For some odd, backwards reason, the UK is possibly the only country in Europe that still has seperate cold and hot water faucets. The result: either you scald your hands while trying to do something like wash your face, or you're shivering as you're doing it. Choose your poison.

Finally, the thing that I do miss most about California is just California itself. It's home and you never realize until you leave it that it is where you belong. Despite Britain's beautiful green fields, it's history, the culture, the art, California will always be home. In the end, the place where you feel most like yourself is the place where you belong, where your life really is.

Though if someone offered me a chance to live in Paris, I might reconsider this last statement.


image courtesy of Wikipedia

Next time: musings on the Germanic tour (Belgium, Amsterdam, Germany, Switzerland, and Austria)!

Of Homesickness and Disappointment

There are apparently 5 stages to culture shock when you move to a new place, they are listed as followed (this is taken from the culture shock handout the Warwick International Office gave us in our orientation packet):

1. Honeymoon or incubation stage. Everything may seem new and exciting.
2. Transition period. Communication problems occur and feelings of incompetence and frustration at not being understhood may arise.
3. Realization of some understanding, a feeling of direction and of wanting to belong.
4. Recognition that the new culture has both good and bath things to offer.
5. Re-entry shock. this occurs when you return home.

Of course, not everyone goes through the stages but during orientation, they say that after you get through Stage 2, everything gets better. Well, while I did not get the culture shock of "oh my god, I'm in England and everything is so different" when I first arrived, lo and behold, I did go through the homesickness/disappointment/"Everything sucks, what the hell am I doing here?"

It all began my first Monday at the University of Warwick, January 5th, only 3 days after I arrived. After what can only be described as a hellish first day (which started out fine enough, it was snowing), I did not get the classes I wanted (only having 5 options to choose from), had no one to talk to, nowhere to go, and thus ended up spending the end of the first day of class alone in my room wondering why am I not having that fantastic time with my hypothetical English friends. Then, to relieve boredom, I went on that evil entity known as Facebook. It was then, looking at the status of the people back home that I realized, fuck, I am on the other side of the world, everybody's lives are going on without me, I don't have any of the my closest friends or family to make me feel better, and I am utterly utterly alone. To top it off, I don't know if the classes I'm taking will transfer over to UCLA, not to mention they are classes I tried my best to avoid while at UCLA. And I was afraid that talking about it with someone would cause me collapse into a whimpering, blubbering mess, the likes of which I have not felt in quite a long time. I expected this to happen in theory but I never imagined it would be that bad or how absolutely miserable I would feel. It's amazing how, at that moment, in a house with 12 people, where you can hear the sounds of the people in the next room, how completely alone you feel.

And what to do?

Roll with it, find someone to talk to (or text with), avoid Facebook like the plague, and sleep. Tomorrow is another day. And most of all, have faith that it will get better.

The rain from my window, serene almost.

And a week later...it has. Classes are better (I finally got into a Romantic Poetry class after waiting a week for it to open), I've met some really cool people, both in my flat and outside of it, and despite the rain, everything is beautiful. As always, you have to be kiên nhẫn, be patient and have faith that despite how bad it may look sometimes, everything will look ụp

Next post, join me as I finally go into town!

Random Britishisms I learned today:

• "Where's Waldo" in England is actually called "Where's Wally." In the words of my flatmates, "Waldo's an ugly name!"
• "Pop in"/"Pop out" - to quickly go into somewhere/quickly exit
• British accents become normal and less exotic after you listen to it for a really long time (such as having to hear your flatmates speak like that for a week now)
• "Soda" refers to club soda, not soft drinks.