Taysia Ross: Surprise Culture Shock

On the day that I flew to the University of California Riverside I was so excited to meet new people, especially everyone from different countries.  I just kept thinking about how cool it would be to have friends from different countries and cultures.  I knew that I was going to be arriving in the United States so I never really thought that I was going to experience culture shock.  When I got to the hotel in California I was quite overwhelmed when I realised that a majority of the others spoke a language that I did not understand.  I had been so happy to meet everyone that I never really thought that they would have any troubles speaking English.  Even though I was in the States which is quite similar to Canada, I instantly felt culture shock.    

For the first few days, everyone pretty much only hung out with the people that they came with.  Everyone was really friendly but since it was so hard to communicate, no one was really willing to make an effort at first.  One night, all of the Canadians and all of the students from Spain were at the pool and we all started to chat.  It was nice to finally get to know some new people, and although it was difficult to make sure that both parties understood, it was great to finally branch out.  After that night, I was able to go up to anyone and have a conversation.

One of the most difficult experiences that I had in California was trying to communicate with my Japanese roommate.  When I first met her she could barely speak any English and when she did speak it, I couldn’t understand.  I couldn’t even ask her what time she was going to wake up the next morning because she just didn’t know enough words.  It was quite frustrating at the beginning but on the second day, she told me that she really wanted to learn English.  I then understood that she was trying her best, and so I told her that I would help her learn.  The next two weeks, before we would go to sleep, I would sit down with her and just go through new words for her to learn.  It was so rewarding to see her improve in such a short amount of time.  By the time we went to Orlando, we were able to have full conversations and we were both sad that we were going to have to live with other people.

For the past month I have made some great friends from different countries.  It is actually quite fun to be able to teach English to some of the international students here.  Even from the beginning of this trip, many of them have already improved their English and I think by being around them, I have also been able to understand different accents better.  This has been the first time in my life where English isn’t always the primary language so I am glad that I have had this challenge and that I am able to overcome it.