It has been two months since I returned home from Paris. During my last few weeks abroad, I could not wait to get home because it was too hard knowing that my time in France was at a quick end. When I arrived back in January, everything felt full of possibilities: travel, learning a language, meeting new people. However, during my last weeks there, I had a hard time processing all that had happened because it was still happening. I started listening to Party in the U.S.A. while walking across the Seine to immerse myself in American culture. I stopped caring whether or not my French was good enough to communicate in coffee shops and clothing stores. At the same time, I was also trying to absorb all the French culture I didn’t experience. I started buying some of my favorite books in French or diving into the foreign film scene. Looking back on this time now, I can fully process what has happened, and I ache to be back in my little hotel room eating a baguette in bed.
I overlook some challenging aspects of studying abroad because my experience is full of terrific memories. However, I will not discredit the difficulties I felt during the five months living away. One thing that I had trouble adjusting to was Parisians’ attitudes toward strangers. In Florida, everyone is amiable in restaurants and stores, bending over backward to accommodate your needs. In French culture, people do not act overly welcoming to strangers. I had a hard time adjusting to this because I take everything personally. During the first months, friends constantly reminded me that whenever someone at a coffee shop or a store clerk was straightforward about something, it wasn’t a personal affront but a cultural difference.
As the semester went on, I learned to appreciate the cold persona most Parisians take on and even found myself behaving similarly. When I first arrived, I viewed this characteristic of French culture negatively because of how it made me feel. However, it was not a flaw in the people around me but within myself. I had to accept and understand it as a cultural difference and not view it as a defeat. At home, I miss the efficiency of everyone in the city and the perfect balance between work and free time.
Before I left, I promised myself I would never be the classic American abroad: The person who notoriously sticks their nose up at cultural differences. If I read this five months ago, I would roll my eyes at how ridiculous I sound today. I learned that no matter what I tell myself, I am no different than the person sitting next to me. I went into my study abroad with a closed mindset about who I would be, so it was difficult to adjust because I already had a preconception of myself.
In the future, I have a better handle on approaching cultural differences than I did in January. Whenever I see a cultural difference as a flaw, I will reflect on myself and ask if it is the culture or my inability to accept it. When I came to terms with my place in French society toward the end of my trip, everything began to feel serene.