First glimpse of the south
I just read this post again, some two years later. While I feel I have fully acclimated to South Carolina, I can't help but find my first impressions amusing and discouraging. I ended up refuting a handful of these bullet points with my furthered experience.
Feb 1st 2013:
After a few weeks in Clemson I am
starting to settle into a rhythm and in my new habitat I have noticed some
differences in lifestyle, here we go:
1) My mixed undergraduate/ graduate
classes have lots of camouflage, beards and tobacco. There are some serious
“good ole boys”, anyone who has lived in the south or working in wildlife has
surely met these people. When your shirt says, “huntin’ bucks and ridin’
trucks, that’s how I roll” it is hard to not chuckle and realize where you are!
3) Outside of my GIS class people were
having a full on conversation about the shooting range here at school and one
of the guys who worked there who was “incompetent”… now that doesn’t make me
feel good. Side note: is there a shooting range on campus? I don’t even know.
4) Southern hospitality, so far has been a
lie. There is an aire of disingenuity. I have been giving a nasty look when
smiling at people on campus. Everyone averts there eyes doesn’t walk around
chatting with each other like I assumed southerners would. At trivia night I
didn’t have a chair because the place was packed, so I went up to a table with
this older couple and their son and asked to have their spare chair, his
response was, “our coats
are on it”. You have got to be kidding me. They then proceeded to leave within
5 minutes. I mean how rude is that, when a restaurant is completely packed and
people are looking for seats and you say no because of your jacket.
5) On that note, my office mate who I had
yet to meet walked into the office and I turned around and said hello. She
ignored me then walked out, this happened once more and finally I felt so
incredibly awkward that I got up to go introduce myself from behind my cubicle.
Her name was Lindsay; at least she shook my hand.
6) A girl said to me that Californians
were taking over (there’s ~ 6 of us) and we all needed to leave…gladly
7) On the radio I heard two ads
a. Friends of the NRA meeting
b. Overeaters anonymous
8) A classmate who is working on a
project regarding bears and their proximities to residential areas, told me
about a lady who called in to say there was a bear in her backyard and that she
was scared to go to her car and go to work. The men from DNR said they would
come by the house and remove the bear (non-lethally), 20 minutes later she
called back and told them she had taken matters into her own hands and gone
outside and shot the bear 4 times with her pistol….what?
9) I have never drank
more beer in my life.
10) Every older person from
South Carolina that I have met has asked me the same question once they find
out I am from Berkeley, California: “Do you have culture shock yet?”, No, no I
don’t… Do I?
However, after all this nonsense I
have met some really cool people. I think that because I always talk to
strangers I have this idea of the world where people want to help others, and I
am easily disappointed when the opposite is so strongly thrown in my face.
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