Culture Shock

I used to lament every time GW had a study abroad event, like the pre-departure orientation and other similar events. Why? Because all the talked about was culture shock. Here I was, apparently feeling invincible to the inevitable effects of culture shock. How wrong I was. However, I’m lucky enough that (for now) the effects are not debilitating. There are just a couple things I want to vent about Cape Town; these things are not necessarily problems that cannot be overcome, just things that I want to air my grievances about.

1) Air conditioning is exceedingly rare in South Africa. Currently, it is 11:30 PM, and it is 75 degrees Fahrenheit outside. My room is always about 10 degrees hotter. What this means is that, while I want to go to sleep tonight, I will wake up just as sweaty as I was when I went to bed, which right now is scary, because everyone knows I sweat more than your average human, and this is becoming unbearable even as I type.

2) There are no dryers (or as they call them here, “tumblers”) anywhere close by. I have to air dry my clothes. Which means that laundry is not just an afternoon (although I complain about spending 2 hours doing laundry at GW, I’d trade that in a heartbeat) endeavor, it takes at least an entire day.

3) One of my classes had a paper due on Thursday about a reading that we were never given. When we asked our tutor about it, she said she knew nothing about it. There is hardly conversation between the tutors and the professor. To make matters worse, my professor is only our professor until next week. After that, she has no idea who is teaching our class. So, we have no idea what we are going to discuss after that, nor who is going to teach, nor if there will even be people to teach us.

4) In order to go on my spring break trip, I am going to have to buy malaria pills that give me hallucinogenic dreams. Although I anticipated this upon signing up, given that everyone in Cape Town seems to have nightmares more than they have at home, I’m somewhat frightened about the prospect of dealing with these scary dreams.

5) There are no TVs here. All I want to do is watch an episode of Modern Family or The Bad Girls Club.

6) As a secondary problem to that, we have to pay for our internet usage, which is charged per megabyte. Downloading and/or streaming any video is absurdly expensive, so I haven’t even been able to watch any TV online. Combine that with the fact that I have a lot more free time now that classes have started, I am getting slowly more and more irritated when I get bored.

7) My house has become infested with bugs. Whether they be the ants that torment our kitchen, or the mosquitoes that always find a way into everyone’s bedrooms, we all now have bug bites left and right that we cannot get rid of.

8) The most random items are expensive for no reason. I spent $15 today on shampoo because it was the cheapest they had. Where is my 99cent shampoo when I need it!

9) Juices don’t come without pulp. I HATE pulp.

I hope no one reading this thinks that I’m not enjoying my time here. These are just literally the most minor of things that have been becoming slightly grating on my experience here, but things I just like to share to remind myself of what I’m doing here. I’m sure when I get home I will think differently.

Also, I am talking to Parul right now, and just got the best piece of advice: “you just have to not compare it to here (the US) and you’ll be fine”. I think I need to remind myself of that. We all have been so privileged to have exceedingly comfortable lives, while there are people who live in even less lucky circumstances than we do here in Rondebosch.

In other news, I’m going to have a great time this weekend when my seminar class goes to Johannesburg! I’ve wanted to go to Joburg for a long time, and so now we’ll finally have the chance to go! The seminar that went last week raved about their trip, so hopefully ours will be just as awesome. We’re also going to be planning our spring break trip soon, so I’m planning on being fortunate enough to have the time to go to some great countries in southern Africa, and to do some INCREDIBLE things!