Michelle:

Immersion?!? People use this word pretty frequently when the subject of our move to Portugal comes up. It is usually a short, topical conversation much like a fleeting news headline. What actually comes to mind when you use the word immersion? I consider one of my favorite kitchen gadgets an immersion blender which I plunge into a large vat of steaming hot soup and blend it to a silky smooth consistency. Or maybe one of those polar bear challenges where you swim in frigid water during the coldest months of the year. Usually whatever immersive activity you are engaged in, be it a language class, an afternoon adventure, or a vacation ends and you resume whatever is “normal” for you.

Living an immersive experience as an expat sometimes makes me feel like a kid who knows little to nothing about how to operate in a grown up world. Some days the smallest task seems like a gargantuan undertaking. I still haven’t sent any letters or postcards. This is something I used to be quite consistent about, but so far I am failing miserably at getting it done. I have a growing list of thank yous, birthdays, bereavement, and a wedding to acknowledge that keep getting put off for “another day”.

Sometimes I procrastinate what used to be a simple chore like going to the pharmacy. See various concerns: will they understand my Portuguese, do I have to see a doctor first, will I need blood tests, will they have the medication I need, can I just show them my US prescription? Usually I have made a mountain out of a molehill as with most anxiety that is anticipatory in nature. The pharmacy trip took less than 5 minutes and was just over €3 for 2 months of medication. The pharmacy employee understood me with no problems and had what I needed on hand.

I expect this topic to surface time and again as new expats starting over in a foreign land. I used to say at work “you don’t know what you don’t know”. We are definitely experiencing that as we slowly work to resolve the unknowns one hurdle at a time.

Andrew:

We inadvertently ended up in a neighborhood that has forced us to dive into the deep end in the process of trying to fit in with our community. There are plenty of regions in the country that allow ex-pats full control of when, how, and even if they will integrate. We have met English speaking residents who have lived in the country over eight years and don’t know the word for Monday and certainly can’t form a complete sentence in Portuguese.

Our initial belief that “almost everyone in the Algarve speaks English” which kept being repeated over and over (usually by English speakers) was shattered within about one hour of arriving in the city. We are resourceful and had always intended on working diligently at learning the language and “integrating” but I can certainly say that I vastly underestimated a secondary cultural layer.

First off I will admit with no reservations that I was short-sighted and egocentric in my passive assumptions about cultural history. Obviously in Portugal people don’t celebrate Thanksgiving or the Fourth of July, but they probably have equivalents and it will be fun to learn those traditions. Everyone in the world approximately my age watched Sesame Street and MTV, ate Fruit by the Foot, saw The Shining, and has at least a referential familiarity with The Golden Girls. Music, books, historical events, these things are all globalized in the internet age right?

Wrong, stupidly wrong, illogical. All I’d have had to do is think for one minute about what I knew about Portugal’s culture to begin grasping at how little I knew. Obviously I likely couldn’t name a Portuguese holiday, TV show, actress, singer, novel, or most anything else so why would I assume that a Portuguese person would know jack shit about the USA? Why would they care when they have a long (much longer than the USA’s) and diverse cultural heritage of their own?

This second level of immersion is the ice cold water at the bottom of the ocean we’ve jumped into. We are learning the language and our professor thinks we will be able to have a basic conversation in Portuguese early next year if we are diligent with our studies (we can both have topical conversations now, as long as they don’t veer off in unexpected directions). Only once we complete that first step can we even begin working to understand and acclimate to the country we have chosen to live in.