Culture Shock

 Culture shock is a sneaky thing. It has an easily-identifiable, obvious surface. Yet it is more than just figuring out that the light switches are backward, trying to call cookies biscuits, and attempting to stop constantly trying to climb into the driver’s side of the car. It is with you every second of every day, and it can be as exhausting as it is exhilarating.

Simply getting through a day can be a monumental task when everything is completely foreign. Is my coworker making a joke or does she really expect me to give her my skirt? Is there an etiquette to who serves themselves lunch first? Where on earth does everyone go to the bathroom? You are also constantly trying to pick anything you can out of the local language conversations swirling all around you. I heard “itaano.” That means “five!” What could they be talking about? Five what? Five thousand shillings? Five delinquent students? Five golden rings? You can’t keep your mind from wandering an hour into a meeting entirely conducted in Runyankore. When someone turns to you to ask you a question you give a blank stare and a nod, only later realizing that you are now heading the Debate Club at school. By the time you reach home, your brain is not operating above a level that instructs your body to put one foot in front of the other.

You also come to realize that you are just as foreign in their eyes – you know a student really isn’t “picking” you, as they say in Uganglish, when you ask them if they use a mosquito net and they answer, “Sponge.” You must politely explain that the marks on your face are actually moles, not mosquito scars, and guesses of your age range from 21 all the way down to 13. Thanks?

There are the exceptionally hard days too, days where you learn that someone you know has just lost multiple loved ones – and that’s not really out of the ordinary. Days when you are sick, from the food or who knows what else, and it saps your strength to deal with everything else that is going on. Or even days when you think that you are fine, and then, unexpectedly, one small thing sends you spiraling downwards again.

However, these lowest of lows also bring the highest of highs. Higher than anything that could be experienced back in that States. On the way to work, you are stopped and thanked by multiple strangers for the work that you are doing. Students with no shoes bring you avocados to thank you for teaching them. You watch your husband get pulled into a local dance, surrounded by people and drummers and singing. You ring in the New Year surrounded by your new Ugandan family, good music, and good food. When it comes time to leave for your site, your host mother struggles to hold back tears. And best of all are the open and honest late-night conversations with Ugandans that create incredible connections you never dreamed possible.

The roller coaster that is culture shock teaches you a valuable lesson – that it is the small things that really matter. You are finally able to enter a duka (a local shop) and conduct an entire conversation in Runyankore. Someone in the community, instead of yelling, “Hey muzungu (foreigner)!” at you, yells “Hey teacher!” instead. You successfully use a pit latrine without thinking twice about it. Three cheers for clean shoes! You learn to take care of banana trees and negotiate a ride into town without getting ripped off. And, at your school, you begin assessing the students one by one, knowing that you are slowly but surely starting your work here.

“You know in my language (Luganda) we say “W’obeera w’olabira enjuba n’omwez/n’emmunyeenyei.” Translated “You can see the moon and the sun/the stars wherever you are.” Meaning: It is in your power to be happy or to be unhappy. What I want to say is that no one will decide for us when and how to make yourself happy. It is in our power to do those things for yourself that make you happy; however small they are.”

            - Ven, a wonderful Ugandan woman and one of my Peace Corps supervisors