Can someone please tell me what America is like now?

by Marian Schembari on September 28, 2012

I haven’t been home in two years. Haven’t seen my brothers or my best friend. Haven’t had a real apple pie or tasted my grandmother’s cooking. Two years.

TWO.

EFFING.

YEARS.

Part of me doesn’t understand how that happened. I am not that person. But, here I am, and it’s been two and half years since I’ve lived in the United States. Two years since I’ve been home at all. I had no idea that when I came here it would be so permanent. But once you arrive in New Zealand, it’s like an entirely different planet. It’s my love/hate relationship with this country… The fact that it exists in its own little bubble separates it from the rest of the world. World news doesn’t matter. Movies, foods, fads, are all decades behind. But, of course, if it weren’t for this isolation it wouldn’t be the spectacular, charming, awe-inspiring country that it is.

Which is why I’m torn about going home. I won’t be here forever. And as my time winds down, my visa runs low and my homesickness gets ever greater, I wonder what being American really means.

When I first moved abroad I couldn’t wait to get out of the States, but I also couldn’t stand how much negativity we got as a people and as a country. While the rest of the world doesn’t hate us as much as Americans think they hate us (read this post), there definitely isn’t a sweeping positive feel-good vibe about the Great US of A.

How is it possible that I feel so homesick and so sick about returning home? Is the States even my home anymore? What is it even like?

The longer I live away, the more I realize how easy it is to hate on America. I’ve based my entire knowledge of Americans on four things in the past two years:

  1. Foreign news reports
  2. Popular culture that makes it’s way over here (movies, bad TV shows that happen to get international syndication, and celebrities famous for nothing i.e. Kim Kardashian and Justin Bieber)
  3. American tourists
  4. Facebook status updates from people I haven’t seen since high school

These four things have made me think of Americans as:

  1. Violent
  2. Shallow materialists with an odd sense of humor
  3. Loud idiots with no sense of direction
  4. Obsessively crazed about politics and either very strongly conservative or very strongly liberal

How can I have possibly forgotten what Americans are actually like? How can I possibly have let non-Americans so fully influence my opinions of Americans? And why am I so suddenly terrified about a simple Christmas visit?

Because, if anything, Christmas is when there is nowhere else I’d rather be. I want the white lights and the snow and the New York City trees. I want the big family dinners and the eggnog and the Frank Sinatra Christmas carols. No way in hell I can do another BBQ Christmas with carols from the 1980s, Santas wearing Bermuda shorts and garish lights on palm trees.

But here I am, two years since leaving home, and completely unaware of where home actually.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Tagged as: , , , ,

  • http://www.stephauteri.com Steph Auteri

    I often think of Americans that way, too, and I LIVE here! I mean, stereotypes exist for a reason. But they typically only reflect a segment of the population. But what’s my America like? A hotbed of creative and entrepreneurial initiative. A cultural (melting pot) goldmine. Family-friendly suburbs, with quick access to bustling cities. A foodie’s paradise (whether I’m in the mood to eat local + organic… or in the mood to eat absolute crap). A dangerous place for a recovering shopaholic. And so many more things. MY AMERICA WELCOMES YOU WITH OPEN ARMS AND GIANT HUGS AND OVERSIZE FOOD PORTIONS.

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

       Haha, that’s awesome. You’re totally right too, and it’s people like you that inspire me to come home. Just like every country (umm… NEW ZEALAND??!!) has stereotypes, they’re rarely every single person in the population and while logically I know America is so diverse and huge and different, I’m having trouble adjusting to the idea of coming back.

      That said, you’re 100% correct about all the amazing things about our land of the free and you’ve totally excited me about coming home :)

      Also? Let’s plan on giant hugs and lots of food, mmkay?

      • http://www.stephauteri.com Steph Auteri

        I can’t wait! Yay!

  • thenorthernist

    I would totally live in Steph’s America :)

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

      Me too.

      • thenorthernist

        The longer I live outside the US, the more I wonder about it becoming a completely foreign country to me. But when I do go back, it doesn’t take long to slip back into the familiar. My hometown hasn’t changed all that much; while that’s comforting in some ways, I don’t know if I would ever move back there.

        The good things that have been mentioned will make re-entry that much better (good Mexican food, I miss it). I hope the transition isn’t too bumpy.

  • http://twitter.com/marianschembari/status/251673858061512706 Marian Schembari

    Can someone please tell me what America is like now? http://t.co/ARSo8UBZ

  • @dbsalk

    Marian, you’re not missing much. I don’t think America has seen too many significant changes in the past two years. Depending on which way you lean, one of the political parties has gone way too extreme. Apple products are still overpriced. Reality tv, sadly, has not gone the way of the dodo. Celebrities are still given an insane amount of attention and money for not doing much except being attractive. Gas prices are high, especially near Chicago. Speaking of Chicago, the Cubs are still awful, but there’s optimism at Addison and Sheffield thanks to the onboarding of former Red Sox GM/wunderkind Theo Epstein. “Shades of Gray” has made erotica mainstream. The NHL season may not happen. Bacon is having a sort of renaissance.

    Things that are great about America:

    Being one of a dozen people at a reading by a NY Times best-selling author
    a couple of days before he appears at a Harry Potter convention
    attended by thousands
    Jimmy John’s, Potbelly’s, or any other sandwich shop that isn’t Subway
    People-watching at the mall
    “The Good Wife” on CBS, and “Fringe” on Fox
    “Midnight in Paris” starring Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams
    Accepting that Chicago-style pizza is not necessarily better than New York-style pizza, and New York-style pizza is not necessarily better than Chicago-style pizza. They’re just different.
    Stephen King
    Free wifi

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

       Beautiful! Thank you so much David. Your right, those things are AWESOME about America. Love it! I can’t wait for free wifi and HBO and pizza. Oh, and I can’t flipping wait to eat good Italian and good Mexican. TWO YEARS.

  • http://twitter.com/briannevillano/status/251681764714618880 Brianne Villano

    RT @marianschembari: Can someone please tell me what America is like now? http://t.co/ysvNF0T1

  • Sarah

    Welcome to the Twilight Zone! I hate to break this to you, but you’ll never be the same again now that you have lived abroad. You have discovered new ways of doing things, new ways of thinking and living, and they have changed you forever, for better and for worse. Now you can (can’t help it, really!) step back and see your own country from a different perspective. 

    Some people never adjust back in their home country (my case); others do just fine. Either way, you are now a changed person, which is both a curse and a blessing — since you know all about that love/hate relationship, I’m sure you know what I mean.

    For what it’s worth, I think the US of A is the most ossum country there is. :)

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

      Oh great, thanks for that ;-) I think I’ve decided that the ‘never be the same again’ is both a good and bad thing. Discovering new ways of the world is always a plus, but it does mean my old life – the life I’m familiar with – might never be good enough.

      I’m sorry to hear you never adjusted back. But you also have such a beautiful and articulate comment I’m sort of glad I have someone to relate to :)

  • http://twitter.com/beallison/status/251845132008169472 Ben Allison

    New Blog Post Can someone please tell me what America is like now? http://t.co/VVvCwuUz

  • http://www.percolate.co.nz/ Lucy Smith

    It’s because your version of Christmas means family, plain and simple. NZ Christmas to me isn’t about the Santa in shorts, or the garish lights on palm trees, or the ’80s carols (well, maybe a little bit of the ’80s carols) – it’s about backyard cricket, loooong days, a couple of glorious weeks off work, Boxing Day (which if we’re lucky will be sunny and wonderful), and pohutakawa in bloom. (I’m going to draw a veil over the interminable Vicar of Dibley reruns.)

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

      Exactly! It’s funny how much our childhood experiences influence our desires as adults. Every Kiwi I know of course sees Christmas as sunshine and BBQs and time off. Which of course is a beautiful, fantastic thing I’ll of course miss, but because of what we grow up with, we tend to have this intense nostalgia for that time of year, always wanting to recreate…

  • http://twitter.com/alexisgrant Alexis Grant

    The introspective Marian is back! Love it. Traveling opens our eyes in so many ways we wouldn’t expect. But I imagine that as soon as you get back home, it will be like you never left :)

    • http://marianlibrarian.com Marian Schembari

      Haha, thanks Lex. Traveling really does open your eyes and I’m not sure what I’m scared of more – returning home and having it feel unfamiliar or returning home and feeling like the most important two years of my life never happened.

  • Pingback: Link love (Powered by cheesecake and returning to routine) | NZ Muse

  • http://yalla-bye.blogspot.com/ cantaloupe

    I went home last summer for the first time in a year and within a week, I was the obnoxious, materialistic, etc. American that I’d been before. I forgot that I once loathed those aspects of myself and saw no problem with them. I fit right in all over again with no problem. And you will too, don’t worry.

    And now I’m abroad again and I loathe Americans again, haha. Especially during the Presidential race. Oh man, so much loathing for any American friend who even mention something slightly political right now….

  • http://twitter.com/chickybus/status/254440718305730561 Lisa E

    RT @MarianSchembari: Can someone please tell me what America is like now? http://t.co/HWeCFByw

  • http://twitter.com/caralopezlee/status/254461754602557440 Cara Lopez Lee

    RT @MarianSchembari: Can someone please tell me what America is like now? http://t.co/HWeCFByw

  • Sense

    I am an American living in Auckland as well (going on 5 years!), and go back home (US) every year to visit. The first week or so is weird. There are SO MANY PEOPLE! It is thrilling but makes me slightly claustrophobic. The cars are on the wrong side, as are the drivers. The food is amazing. The shopping is endless. The people are all speaking “normally”. Free WiFi is everywhere. You savor every bite and opportunity that you missed while you were away from whatever your particular brand of “US crack” is. The crazy politics and crazily loud, overexaggerated media drive you crazy. Almost nothing has changed in a year, but it is all really unusual to you. And then after a while you don’t even notice it, because that is what you were used to before you moved. It is very easy to slip back into your old habits and eat and do the things you used to love and missed desperately while you were away (Trader Joes, whaaat?), but I agree with other posters–you never quite forget what is like outside of the US, and how spoiled we really are, just because of where we were born. We take a lot for granted (oh, insulation and central air and Target, how I adore thee.)

    Good luck not hitting the windshield wipers when you mean to hit the turn signal, though…I don’t think that will ever stop. :)

  • Heather Baron

    I agree with Steph. I’ve lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for most of my life (except for a few years in Canada and the Pacific Northwest) and love living here. BUT I sure as heck don’t like everything Americans do or stand for; I love to travel but loathe American tourists and how our media often depicts our country and culture (Jersey Shore? please just kill me). I won’t go so far as to wear a Canadian flag pin when I travel, because I want to prove to the rest of the world that there are many varieties of Americans, not just the annoying crazy ones.

    Recently I noticed something very interesting about What America is Like Now:Last year my commute got longer and I began listening to local news radio to hear the traffic. All of a sudden, I found out that people were getting shot multiple times a week, running over bikers and pedestrians, and being driven out of their homes by fires. Additionally, all the local leaders turned out to be jerks who were engaged in scandals or stealing money. I couldn’t believe I’d been living here all this time and never noticed this stuff, or that things had suddenly taken such a turn for the worse. After almost a year of this, I started listening to a local NPR station instead. What an incredible and enlightening experience! I still get my news (local, state, and national), actually I get a ton more than I used to, but the tone is vitally different – calm, thoughtful, musical, positive, nuanced, balanced. I no longer feel harried and overwhelmed and stressed out and scared and ashamed to live here when I listen to the radio. I check local news online now, to keep tabs on where, specifically, all that bad stuff is happening, but I also see now that it was always happening, just as it does in any other major urban city in the country. It’s a shame, but it doesn’t mean this whole wonderful area I call home is unsafe or scary.I had forgotten that what I allow as an input matters a lot to how I view the world and the people around me.I’m not saying we should block out the negative stuff or deny it exists, not at all, but when you return, consider that when you lived here, you had a *lot* more daily inputs than the four you mentioned. So, their negative aspects probably held a lot less weight in your perception of who you were and where you lived than did the inputs and experiences driven by family, friends, and your personal pursuits. I hope your visit is awesome and your return to NZ is even better!

  • http://twitter.com/CarlosMCorderoB Carlos Cordero

    Go home for the good reasons and enjoy.  If I believed everything the media writes about Peru I would have gotten my family here as refugees.  Go and get pampered by your family, see old friends and haunts, breathe the air, listen to people talking.  Be merry.
    Then do come back to us because NZ would become a little bit boring without you around.

  • http://twitter.com/CarlosMCorderoB Carlos Cordero

    Go home for the good reasons and enjoy.  If I believed everything the media writes about Peru I would have gotten my family here as refugees.  Go and get pampered by your family, see old friends and haunts, breathe the air, listen to people talking.  Be merry.
    Then do come back to us because NZ would become a little bit boring without you around.  :)

Previous post:

Next post: