I remember in the 1970s the thing that most intrigued me about traveling in a country other than my own was the tiny details—the habits with which we tie our lives up.
We rise at six, breakfast at seven, and start work at eight. These familiar unconscious expressions marked our cultural space.
We know the different names of countries, languages, currencies, customs, and climates. In pursuit of adventure, we devoured travel books and histories, filling our minds with the silver-screen images of new lands with fresh, crisp, green grass.
But our first steps in that new land were often met with profound irritations over the petty disparities of simple things.
Once disgorged into the curious mass of humanity leering on airport banisters, we are struck by the different scents, tastes, and smog in the new environment’s air. Our defenses were triggered as we sought to smoke out the assailant, to understand the changes, the disquieting feeling of being in a foreign country.
When our stay becomes permanent, these discomforts become exasperating, and our cultural snobbery kicks in, threatening our cultural blanket of resistance.
During my travels, in the 1970s—which included most of Europe, the Middle East, North and West Africa, Mexico, Jamaica, and North America—I was constantly dumbfounded, bemused, and frustrated by what appeared a conspiracy of difference for the sake of difference.
Why, I asked, would anyone go through the trouble of designing and marketing a thousand and one types of toilet paper, when one size fits all?
In America, one has a multiple choice of soft, super-soft, super-super-soft, and new improved extra-soft… ad infinitum!
In the UK, the range is truly staggering, from the downright course to the silky velvet (possibly commissioned by Royal Charter).
Indeed, toilet paper refining has become an indicator of class consciousness. I met an American woman in London, who made a collection of these exotic articles. She was fascinated by the choices and believed the ‘folks-back-home’ would love these cultural curiosities.
In some countries, toilet paper is not used at all. The left hand is responsible for this function. This can come as a disconcerting shock to the newcomer, especially after he or she is midway through their performance! A cup or bucket of water replaces the familiar roll.
After the initial horror of such fecal indulgence, a certain logic presents itself:
Firstly, no child—or adult can escape the ‘throne room’ without washing their hands; unless, of course, they like the pungent odor of waste-matter about their person.
Secondly, toilet paper cannot then add to the pollution and blockage of the commode environs, creating that all-too-disagreeable smell.
Thirdly, with no consumer demand, many more trees would be saved (100 million a year) by not having their trunks cut short and turned into paper to grace our posteriors.
Such privations and the experiences of domestic habits give logic to the adage: never shake someone’s hand with your left hand.
Travelers, from around the world, have a thirst for new communications. (circa 1970s) What are these new sounds? Why the different hum? Where does one pay to hear?
The telephone has become our ear to the world. Its universal conformity would therefore be a sensible idea. However, the trifling distinctions of the dial tones across the world have always bemused and perplexed me.
In the UK, the dial tone is pitched in a staccato E and charges out, demanding why you’ve disturbed its inner sanctum. One inserts coins, after dialing - waiting for a connection - by which time the system has relapsed into a coma.
The dial tone suddenly returns, in the nerve-shattering key of E, reminding you where the Sex Pistols got their musical training!
In America, the dialing tone purrs in middle C, cherishing your patronage, ringing gently, encouraging commerce.
Foreign telephone systems exasperate Americans the most. Coming from a land where a telephone is a birthright, a substitute for a pacifier, Americans abroad battle with jammed coin openings, feisty operators, the excessive cost, and the frightening key of E which would have baffled even Mr. Edison into rethinking his other 1000 experiments!
Once conditioned by the UK’s medium of communication, the next facile fascinating frustration is the banal discrepancies of words.
England and America are divided, famously, by the same language. But the common misinterpretation of words belies their common usage. Not so much because the words are different but because of the trivial distinctions. (I’m still processing BAD meaning GOOD!)
For example, the American ‘downtown’ is the British ‘city center,’ subways are tubes, piers are quays, a duplex is a semi-detached, an apartment is a flat, elevators are lifts, the first floor is the ground floor…ad infinitum.
The literal distinctions make one wonder what is common about sense, or the English language. (William the Conquer tried his best!)
Wouldn’t you agree the sound of the word autumn is preferable to fall? Wallet to billfold? Cotton to thread? Drawing pin to thumb tack? Queue to line? One defines an item or situation, while the other defines its function.
There is a serious side to this dilemma which is more acute than the difference between TO-MATE-TOES and TO-MAR-TOES. The linguist is constantly thrown off guard using terms like closet for cupboard, truck for lorry, faucet for tap, muffler for silencer, and vest for waistcoat (we won’t go into cul-de-sacs called dead-ends, or a fortnight is two weeks).
The trivia mounts: an American/British phrasebook would therefore be an extremely useful addition for travelers to the United Kingdom.
Travel, they say, broadens the mind. However, the emotions take a battering in the process. On short stays in foreign lands, everyone is granted the license of cultural self-righteousness arrogance. But as one’s stay becomes extended, that nation’s idiosyncrasies begin to seep into one’s subconscious, colonizing the instincts.
Before long, you catch yourself saying restroom instead of public convenience and asking the operator for a person-to-person call. Old habits die hard, however, and occasionally you lapse back into euphonious words such as biscuit, instead of the jocular ‘cookie.’ But by then it’s too late because you’ve become a foreigner.
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2 comments
You've added several layers of complexity and intrigue, making it a much richer and more engaging read.
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I wrote the story to express my wonder about travel and wondered if others had similar experiences. If so, I'd like to hear from you. Also, do you agree or disagree that the differences between people are the small details, Why or why not? I encourage dialog from both points. Namaste
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