I'm at a party with Jorge and a group of his friends, all Peruvians. I'm mostly following the conversation, at around 80%, when I work up the courage to throw in a comment. Everyone laughs, and I have no idea why what I just said is funny. I don't know if I'm turning red or even more pale, but I can feel the temperature in my cheeks changing and I stare at my glass. Unfortunately, this is not an isolated occurrence.
Living in a foreign country is hard. Everyone has heard of culture shock, maybe even has a friend living abroad who has recounted his or her moments of misery. However, somehow I thought that since I speak Spanish pretty well I was immune from this phenomenon. I don't know if everyone who goes abroad also secretly thinks this or if I am alone in this.
When I stepped onto the plane six months ago with my one-way ticket to South America, I was nervous, not sure what to expect, but mostly overwhelmed with excitement for the adventures that would follow. I would be seeing great sights, meeting new people, and trying exotic foods, all while improving my Spanish. I went backpacking for over five months, from the tip of Patagonia to the jungles of Ecuador, and it was incredible. That's not to say that I didn't have moments of homesickness, but in every new place was a hostel full of instant friends in the form of like-minded travelers ready to chat over coffee, get blitzed on cheap beer, and drop their half-formed plans in order to travel with you for the next week.
Living in a foreign country is different. Backpackers occupy a sort of hedonistic limbo, traipsing from country to country in the absence of the responsibilities of everyday life. In contrast, when you live somewhere, the excitement of the new and exotic is tempered by the same responsibilities and stresses that exist in the US: searching for an apartment, finding a job, paying bills. And all of this happens in a foreign language. In addition, there may be annoyances that are completely new. In Lima, this takes the form of horrible traffic, loud and insistent horn-honking, and lack of organized public transportation.
But tedium and traffic are tolerable. The real problems come from the sense of being a perpetual outsider, culturally and linguistically. I speak very good Spanish, but classroom Spanish and real-world Spanish are different. Negotiating a hostel room or navigating the nightmarish Lima transportation system are no problem. Following a conversation between good friends, often in a loud bar, is another thing entirely. Jorge, bless his heart, assures me that when I don't understand something, I can just ask him. But what can I do when there's so much I don't understand? It's frustrating to be unable to participate in conversations. Without the tools to communicate, you become less vibrant a person, unable to contribute.
Even apart from the language, there is an entire realm of cultural knowledge that I'm not in on. Viral videos, that TV commercial from the 90s... these are the fodder for jokes and reminiscing. From politics to stupid reality shows to popular entertainers, there are a ton of cultural references that I did not grow up with, and therefore don't understand. All this is almost enough to make one retreat permanently to the comfort of the expat community, or to simply turn right around and go home.
Now, lest you think that living abroad is always depressing and I am having a terrible time of it here, it's not and I'm not. I'll talk about all the great things going on here in a future post, so please don't feel sorry for me. Ok, maybe just a little.
