Culture Shock II

So today, I went with Tessa and Nick, who live in my home stay with me, and have been here for three weeks now, to the United States Independence Day Celebration that was held at a compound in Kathmandu which is owned by the USA. We went in hesitantly and expecting it to be utterly ridiculous. Especially after the very serious email invitation that had a strict RSVP by June 26th rule, and encouraged everyone to arrive promptly, (how very American... especially in Nepal.) On top of that US citizens only, plus Nepalis who work for some specific place, and their immediate family, passports required for entry.

I have to start with, I think all three of us faced culture shock II. Culture shock is what you know, culture shock II is the much more fascinating, and for me depressing, version of culture shock that you usually experience upon going home after a long trip. Re-adjusting to a culture that is in so many ways your own is much more difficult than having the excuse of "this place is new for me" that you get to use when experiencing typical culture shock.

Here is a descent link which can probably explain it better. http://kultureshock.wikispaces.com/DEFINING+CULTURE+SHOCK

So we went in prepared for it to be darn hysterical. And it was. We went through security and had to show our passports multiple times. It was funny. It really was. All of it was humorous. I mean just the idea that US citizens all in Nepal were invited pretty much to a big barbecue, it really is a funny concept. However within the first two minutes... we all just got pretty quiet. Why is this happening? Why does this place exist? I even mentioned as we stopped and stared at first that it really felt like a twilight zone to which both Tessa and Nick eagerly agreed. Were we in America? Were we in Nepal? There were mountains in the background, but red white and blue balloons and flags and tents serving beef burgers (Nepalis don't consume beef since Hinduism is a primary religion here). There was a blow up bouncy slide, and a dunk tank and a cotton candy stand. There was a watermelon eating contest and loud speakers blaring "Born in the USA". It felt like home. Which was nice. I love home. Don't get me wrong on that fact. But it just felt so wrong. SO wrong. There were Marines in uniform with their families in red and blue sundresses. Women wore tank tops and khaki shorts. Even typing this right now I'm just so confused by that. Like, we were still in Nepal. But really where were we?

I had a barbecue veggie burger, which was delicious beyond belief, and french fries with ketchup. We were really happy with our food. But we just sat there and stared. It was really hard not to.

It was this in between world of white people in clothes from home and Nepali women in saaris eating cotton candy. It was Marines with their blonde wives and blonde daughters in their little kid tank tops, sitting around a table under a tent eating hot dogs and drinking beer. But the air smelled like Kathmandu and just beyond the big walls of the compound were women leaned up against those same walls begging for food for their children, crouched over with more wrinkles than you could ever count. If I've ever been thrown into a really strange situation it was definitely today at the 4th of July, Independence Day Celebration held on June 28th in the middle of Kathmandu, Nepal.

Can you just tell how scattered this post is? I promised to blog but quite honestly its hard when the whole thing completely felt like a dream.

Okay, so to save you the time, since I know most of you are busy North Americans who value productivity; we walked out of the gate and back into the crazy city of Kathmandu and we all pretty much took a deep breath. Like it honestly felt good to be back. It was a sense of a relief to be removed from the culture shock. I'm not even kidding. We were happy to have left. The streets of Kathmandu felt so much more "right" to my system. I was more than happy to walk around Thamel through the muddy sidewalks with power cords hanging over my head.

I'm not sure I'm even ready to make this blog post about comparing the two cultures, or pointing out the faults in each system. I can't even make any educated statement quite honestly. What I can say is, if I got culture shock II today, I'm really in for it during my seven hour lay over in Philadelphia before reaching Detroit six weeks from now...