The first thing I noticed about being back was the sheer number of people with whom I interacted every day. In my daily life in Cambodia, I interact with the staff and our students during the work week, but in my personal life, I experience much less social interaction than I did living in Boston. First of all, living in a country with a native language different from your own immediately impacts the number of those spontaneous interactions that are commonplace in your home country. Secondly, we live at school and the city is 40 minutes away, so we do spend a lot of our free time at home, where there are only two of us. Thirdly, the number of phone calls, text messages, emails and other forms of regular communication are fewer in general, and further limited to a certain few hours of the day, due to the time change. So, truth be told, the social interaction patterns I have developed since being here are quite different to those I had in the U.S. Side note: you may now think that I am socially starved and friendless. I assure you, that is not the case. Actually, who am I kidding? It's all true...my only friends here are ten-year-olds.
Anyway, upon arriving back in the States, the number of people who struck up a conversation with me increased dramatically, and with it came the knowledge that I had become rather socially awkward.
Example A: I went to Target, something I had literally dreamed about doing for months, to purchase a selection of kitchen items that we were unable to find in Cambodia. Among them cupcake tins and an electric hand mixer. When I reached the check-out counter, the sweet, older man cashing me out made a remark about how I was crazy to be baking in such hot weather. I was so out of practice at making small talk with vendors that I literally had no response. Then my brain began juggling about fifteen things to say, including: "Well I actually live in Cambodia, which is much hotter than this, but yes, this is quite hot for Boston. And I am not actually buying these to use now, but to bring back with me, which may seem weird, since they are really heavy, and I am worried about overage charges, but we can't buy these things there and I really like to bake even though the Cambodian climate makes baking challenging and my shortbreads never turn out right...", etc. Like a crazy person, I simply stared at him silently and nodded with a strange smile on my face. Yeah. Cool as a cucumber.
Example B: That same day, on a budget shopping spree of sorts, I headed over to Brighton's infamously eclectic Arsenal Mall. Another place I missed, for its blindingly bright, bass-pumping Forever21 on your immediate left, the Gap Outlet where you can buy half-priced polos and feel like you are cheating the corporate system, and the interesting clientele; there are usually at least two ancient-looking Chinese men asleep in the sitting area as the burrito-lovers in Chipotle watch them drool. Anyway, as I was leaving this fine establishment, (I'll admit it...burrito in hand), two teachers from one of my old schools were coming in. I saw them and my brain registered exactly who they were. But, for some reason, my mind went blank and was then overtaken by the image of myself trapped by these two women, explaining in detail the last five years of my life. So, you may ask, what did I do? I quickened my pace and exited before they could stop me. As if these ladies, who I barely knew and had only worked with for a year, were all that interested in spending their afternoon listening to my life story.
Upon reflection, I realized that Cambodian living had turned me into some sort of strange, non-communicative alien. I had so much on my mind that I could no longer make small talk. I vowed to remedy it. This brings us to Example C. I shall call it: overcompensation.
Entering a Starbucks in Newton Centre (you Bostonians really don't know how good you have it...), a man in his early thirties stopped and held the door open for me. Shocked by his kind gesture and with my earlier social failures fresh in my mind, I shouted out a thank you so loud, so high-pitched and so overly ambitious that the barista adding three pumps to a frazzled looking woman's Passion Fruit Iced Tea Lemonade nearly dropped the grande cup. I was so embarrassed, as was the poor man, that I wished I could turn around and leave. Instead I joined a line of under-caffeinated Newtonites who were probably debating if I was hard of hearing or just insane. Perfect.
To add to my social communication deficits, I was also struggling with the overwhelming feeling that I knew practically everyone who walked by. This was new. For the first time in a year, I was surrounded by people who looked much more similar to me and all the people I know. I must have stopped at least three or four times a day to inspect someone's face on the off-chance that I knew them. Someone would drive by and I was sure it was one of my best friends. Walking in the city, every third person was someone I knew back in college. I was almost never correct, but the feeling didn't go away. Now that I am back in PP, walking through a city where I only actually know a handful of people, I understand why.
Aside from my social failures, which thankfully decreased over time, it was startling to go back to living in a place where you can understand everything that is being said around you. When I am out and about in Phnom Penh, it is assumed that nearly everyone around me is speaking Khmer. Along with the cars honking and the funeral music blasting throughout town, the language of the locals blends into a nice thrumming background noise. I am never really on alert for someone to approach me and ask me something. Once back in the States, I again became privy to everyone else's conversations. In line at Dunkin, I learned all about the party that the BC Summer Staff students had the night before. Waiting to meet a friend at a bar, I listened to an exchange between two friends about whether or not her boyfriend was "the one." At first it was exciting, and made me want to chime in simply because I could: "Hey! I'm a BC alum recently back from a socially awkward year in Cambodia. Would it be cool if I joined in on your next Foster Street rager?! I'll bring the Bud Light!" But after a while it actually got annoying. Excuse me, Bleach Blonde Goth girl and your friend Falling Down Drunk? Hi. Yeah. Can you please take your mumbled conversation elsewhere? I am trying to catch the T and make it home for a ten pm bedtime and I am afraid you may end up causing an accident whereby the T service is suspended. K, thanks.
The other two observations I made were experienced with pure joy. One: driving. Two: being in the same time zone as the people you love. These need no anecdote.
And finally, I observed that Boston is truly a great city, filled with great people. And crazy people. And distressed people. And people who should take their business off the streets and into their homes. Over the course of my short time there, I saw an altercation break out between a T driver and an innocent bystander who witnessed the T driver "purposely try and close the doors on" a girl entering with a large suitcase. "Don't make me come down there!" was uttered more than once in real time. I saw the previously mentioned Falling Down Drunk girl and her partner, literally laying on the floor of the T station together, cooing meaninglessly. I saw a man in his late thirties, clad in Red Sox gear, walking two paces ahead of his young wife, openly crying in Kenmore Square. There was no Sox game that day. I saw a young couple, clearly post blow-out break-up, at an attempted make-up dinner at the Capital Grille on Boyleston. She was wearing a tight leopard dress, pointedly ignoring her man and texting and he was dressed for the financial district with elbows on the table, head in hands.
Take it elsewhere, people. Oh wait, this is America. I missed you!
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