Back at Last!

Hell of a trip, except for the plane ride itself. I’m very sad to have left all my pals in England, but very happy to be back. Very sad to be going to work in a few hours, very happy to get to sleep in my own bed first.

Jonathan remarked that I was pretty quiet on my first night out with him and David, and attributed it to my reluctance to be seen as American. Well, that’s a bit of paraphrasing of something that I was saying, but didn’t quite express the point.

That evening in particular, I was a little wiped out from my trip north, and I was perfectly content to let the two of them lead me around from glam bar to glam bar while they swapped stories of their own recent vacations. I wasn’t feeling a bit shy or self-conscious.

I was explaining, though, that when I’m out on my own in a foreign country, I tend to be quiet as a mouse, very reluctant to open my mouth and betray my nationality. I keep my interactions with waiters, shopkeepers and the like as monosyllabic (though as exceedingly polite) as possible, and quietly pass myself off as a local. Mostly, this is the flip side of my pride in being a savvy urbanite at home. I like to be seen as cool and capable, hip to the local customs and habits no matter where I am, like any jet-setter ought to be. The greatest compliment I can get in a foreign city? Someone coming up and asking me directions.

The other part is, however, that I’m usually a little embarrassed to be an American, and I slip into the role of apologist. It’s not completely true, of course, that Americans are loud and course and pushy when they’re abroad, but it’s more likely than not. American tourists often seem to act like they’re in a particularly vivid part of Disneyland or Epcot Center, but one where they’re not quite getting the service they expect. Every time I’ve been abroad — even in England where we all speak the same language — I cringe when I hear that homegrown accent griping or making some dim-witted exclamation. I never say a peep around other Americans if I can help it. If I’m able to tell they’re my countrymen, it’s probably because they’ve just done something that justifies our bad reputation. This is why when I do interact, I’m so aggressively polite and easy-going. I don’t want to be that guy.

In England, though, I run into a particular dilemma: after a while there, I start to slip into a bit of the accent. I can’t help it, really — I do it in the South, too, and even in Brazil I started to speak like a really good ESL student. I just adapt to what I keep hearing around me. As my use of slang changes and the shapes of my vowel sounds morph, I get even more self-conscious about the sound of my voice, worrying that it sounds like I’m intentionally faking it. If you see me at home in the next few days, you’ll hear it: At this point I’m all, “That bahstard took the piss out of me, just ‘cuz I left my trainers and jumper back at the flat.” I’m an English-language Zelig, not noticing how I try to escape notice. It’s goofy.