New and Improved

As humans we adjust to the environment around us. For example, take three medium sized bowls and fill them with water. One cold, one hot (but not too hot), and one somewhere in the middle. Place one hand in the cowl of cold water and the other in the bowl of hot water and keep them there for about a minute. Now place both hands in the lukewarm bowl of water together. You should notice that the hot water hand feels cold and the cold water hand feels hot.

About three year ago I traveled outside of the US for the first time in my life (no, the day trip to Juarez at age 6 doesn’t count). I left the laid back atmosphere of Hawai`i and upon arriving in Seoul was immediately taken aback by how aggressive and forceful everyone seemed, how traffic laws were seemingly regarded as suggestions, and the haphazard way people seemed to walk, choosing to adhere to neither the left nor the right of pedestrian throughways. Three years later, returning to South Korea after 2 years in Kenya my immediate impressions were that everyone is incredibly polite, traffic is a perfectly ballet of glass and steel coordinated by law abiding citizens, and that everyone except for me seems to know exactly where to walk while I meander aimlessly throughout the sidewalk. What happened? What changed? When did everything become so harmonious?

This morning, a German traveler, freshly arrived from Japan, commented to me on how taken aback he has been by how pushy and hostile people seem here. What changed? Apparently just me. Al Gore tells us that if you put a frog in boiling water it will jump out, but if you put it in tepid water then raise it to a boil you’ll be the proud owner of a dead, boiled frog. Never mind what kind of sadistic frog boiling sicko the former VP got this info from and don’t please try this at home, we’ll just assume they did their homework thoroughly before making their findings public. The point is that I didn’t realize how difficult life was in Kenya or how I was adapting until I went somewhere else.

I’ve learned that I after two years of not wearing deodorant that the smell of it is too overpowering. I can’t pass an electrical socket without thinking about what I can potentially charge at that given moment and I’m constantly thinking about where I can get clean drinking water. I view internet access as a finite commodity and I can’t look at pictures or videos without thinking about how much data I’m chewing up. I’m more comfortable holding hands with other men than you would expect from someone coming from a country where homosexuality is a crime punishable by up to 14 years in prison and I still prefer to squat when going to the bathroom when the option exists. I think about all purchases in terms of how many village lunches I could buy for the same price and find it hard to believe that restaurants actually have all of the foods listed on their menu available at any given time. I’m unused to the idea of events occurring exactly at a certain time, I find it odd to be outdoors after dark, and I still feel the need to sleep with a mosquito net. I’m sure there are many more quirks and habits I’ve picked up that I’m not even aware of yet, so you’ll have to tell me what they are the next time we’re together.