Kaette kita. Tadaima!
While I procrastinate sending all the grad-school-visit-organizing emails I should be sending right now -- belated announcement that I'm back stateside! And I'll be in New Haven next week -- hope I get to see everyone!
Less culture shock coming back this time -- I don't know if that's because I haven't gone native as much this term as I did over the summer, or if I'm just getting used to being generally rootless. There were some definite moments of 'OMG cheese and good bread and real dessert!' and 'OMG, everything is so *clean*!', and maybe it was a little disorienting suddenly being surrounded by foreigners everywhere for the first hour or so back in JFK, but really it felt extraordinarily natural to be home again (and really good to see family). I think I needed this break pretty badly. I expect when I head back to Beijing I'll be all imbued with new energy and enthusiasm.
Unfortunately, it seems that the days when I could proudly claim to be immune to jet-lag are now firmly in the past. Ah well.
Anyway, back to work.
Less culture shock coming back this time -- I don't know if that's because I haven't gone native as much this term as I did over the summer, or if I'm just getting used to being generally rootless. There were some definite moments of 'OMG cheese and good bread and real dessert!' and 'OMG, everything is so *clean*!', and maybe it was a little disorienting suddenly being surrounded by foreigners everywhere for the first hour or so back in JFK, but really it felt extraordinarily natural to be home again (and really good to see family). I think I needed this break pretty badly. I expect when I head back to Beijing I'll be all imbued with new energy and enthusiasm.
Unfortunately, it seems that the days when I could proudly claim to be immune to jet-lag are now firmly in the past. Ah well.
Anyway, back to work.