Sometimes culture shock looks like…

wanting to break your door down.

Have you ever read the book “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day”?  This poor kid is having one of those days and at the end of every page he says, “This is a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day… I think I’ll move to Australia”.  At the end of the book he mom says to him, “Some days are just like that… even in Australia”.

This book may just sum up my feelings towards life the last week or so.  In general life is good.  But all the little situations that I don’t know how to handle here just about to put me over the edge.

I had car trouble.  I paid someone to fix it.  I had car trouble again.  I ended up stranded and didn’t know how to find a tow truck.  Our house doesn’t have water after 9 at night and I have to leave dishes overnight, which I hate.  I’m sweaty, but church lasted 3 hours and I didn’t get home before 9 to take a shower.  We never have water in one of our bathrooms and now the kitchen sink won’t drain.  I don’t know how to find a plumber.  Our landlord isn’t timely, neither is the fix-it man.  The list goes on…

And then the door broke.  After all the other things we got home last night and the door from the kitchen to the back patio won’t open.  This is where the washer is, our clothes are, the fan for the kitchen plugs in, Jeremy has to walk through there to get to his room… I mean we just keep this door open all the time.  But the lock is broken and it is stuck.  We try a screwdriver, knife, fork, brute force, nothing.  Ugh. 

My normal personality (the one where I have perspective):
”No problem.  We can walk around to get to the back of the house.  It will probably only be for 24 hours.  We can get someone to help us fix it.  Its not a big deal.  No worries.”

My culture-shock personality (total frustration):
”I see no way that we will EVER be able to get this door fixed and I’m frustrated.  Jeremy, can you just break the door down?”

Honestly, I was willing to pay to have an entire new door and doorframe and sleep without a door on the house that night just to have the stupid door opened.  Thankfully, my roommates are less frazzled than I and didn’t think that was a good idea.

John came today and fixed it.  Not a big deal.  But we still don’t have water and I think my nerves are still shot.

Culture shock is real.  It happens people.

But some days are just like this.  It could happen anywhere.  Even in Australia :)