Week 8


Image may contain: 10 people, people smiling, people sitting, table and indoor

      I can't even lie that when I first met the people I would be studying abroad with, I did not see the friendships blooming the way they have in recent weeks. I was very worried and didn't see myself connecting with the people from West Virginia, Germany, Oklahoma, or Texas. That old saying that "people will always end up surprising you" is very accurate. I judged every single person I met and was really nervous that I wouldn't have a single friend while I was abroad. The Texas people seemed to have their group, the Oklahoma girls were super close and sorority sisters, I couldn't gauge the WVU kids and we don't see enough of the Germans to make friends with them. This made me realize that branching out to my fellow Mountaineers was the only way to make friends. 
   "Friendships are voluntary relationships we enter into with people with whom we share common traits, shared experiences, or joint goals (Remland, 2015)." The first close friend I made was the one and only Dan Trapani. This kid did not speak a word when we landed in Germany. He was with Hailey a ton, and everyone else was kind of paired off with people they knew, so I thought maybe I would be an outsider by looking at the relationships before me. I judged every single person I met and was really nervous that I wouldn't have a single friend while I was abroad. But Dan Trapani surprised me. Our friendship started as a role limited interaction. This means we were just nice and polite to each other which is expected out of every day interactions with people you share something in common with (Remland, 2015). I quickly realized Dan and I were more alike and had more in common that I initially anticipated. We laughed at the same things. We started moving towards friendships when Dan bought a pack of cigarettes and I smoked with him. This seems silly but I didn't feel like anyone was judging me for the first time since I had been in Germany. We shared a silly taboo together that no one else took part in. Over the next couple weeks we started traveling together and exploring cities. We were new friends in new cities and that helps a relationship grow in a lot of ways. The first time I considered us nascent friends, which is described as realizing we were friends was when I felt comfortable enough to share pieces of my life with Dan and we always found ourselves connected at the hip with our inside jokes everywhere we went. Our friendship reached the stabilized stage about six weeks in. Dan and I are really close. We cook dinner together, we listen to each other complain, we have long conversations and about life and I value his opinion. If you would have told me that Dan would become my best friend on this trip, I would have called you a liar.
    I am so thankful for this time abroad and I am beyond grateful with the friendships I've made. While my closest relationship is with Dan, everyone else has become very special to me as well. my roommates are from Texas and those girls are amazing, my Oklahoma friends are absolutely hysterical, and m fellow mountaineers are kind and authentic humans.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 4: Cultural Frames

Image
We have made it to week four in our SPICE Program and each week brings new adventures. We visited Bruges, Belgium this past week. It was a small but cute city with many fun things to do. We went to a french fry museum and went in and out of a TON of chocolate shops; not to mention we had some really cool hostel-mates, one from England and one from Portugal/Spain! This weeks objective is Cultural Frames . We take what we know from our background and experiences and apply it to our reality (Remland, 2015). Us, as Americans, try to take our social norms and apply them to our environment; and with a different culture comes different social norms. I was once told that Americans have really short goodbyes, but what I found in Bruges, is that they have an even shorter goodbye. You will be purchasing something from the shop and before you have your credit card back and receipt in hand, you are basically pushed out the door. A cultural frame that sticks out to me from the chapter is the In...
Read more

Week 7: Verbal and Nonverbal Communication

Image
European and American verbal and nonverbal communication are quite different. In class, when we are having discussions, I notice that when an American student is called on, we will respond very loudly compared to the German students. I also notice, at the school coffee shop, the man working behind the counter will be very soft-spoken when talking to a customer. I almost want to shout, "CAN YOU TALK A LITTLE LOUDER?!", even though I can hear him perfectly fine from a few feet away. I realize the reason I want him to talk louder is simple: I am nosey. I am also use to a loud coffeehouse setting. When you go to Starbucks in the states, you typically walk into a setting of glasses clinking together, music blaring from the speakers, and names being shouted so people can pick up their orders. With nonverbal, I notice that we also are very different. When the teacher is speaking and looking around the room, she typically makes eye contact with everyone. When she makes eye contact...
Read more

Week 8: Intercultural Communicative Competence

Image
As we come to our last week in Europe, I look back on the memories I have made and the people I have shared them with. When arriving in Germany, I knew I would talk to the people who also went on this trip, but I didn't think I would become friends with them as easy as I did. One person who stands out the most out of all my friendships that I made abroad, is my friendship with Ashley Pearson. When going through the "General Process of Friendship Development  ( Remland, 2015) " in chapter 8 of the book, it describes each of the steps you take when developing a friendship. The first stage is the   Role-Limited Interaction . Whenever you meet someone new, you are usually the nicest person in the world; you don't want to give them a bad impression. I remember being super nice because I really liked Ashley from the beginning. We soon moved to the Friendly Relations stage. This stage is more of an acquaintance stage. We were no longer new to each other, but we weren't...
Read more