challenging learning experience

Name

Instructor 's Name

Sociology

Date

Waking Up to a New Challenge

Since the moment we are born , challenges become part of our every day life

One of the biggest challenges I had to face was when I was seventeen years old . I saw myself in the situation where I had to leave my country after I finally graduated from high school to come to the United States .It was like I had started a new life . I left behind my old town , my family , and the familiar world that

I grew up in . Gatekeeping was a double edged sword --- the prestige that I enjoyed in being one of the very few females in our town to ever set foot in America was laden with worries and apprehension . I was about to tread in an unfamiliar territory and face a social environment that is , at the very least quite different from what I had been exposed to . But if there was one thing that school taught me , and the very thing that granted me this opportunity , it was positivism . And so , armed with a new found source of strength and courage , I was determined to make my stay in the United States an experience that will make my family and my townspeople proud

No matter how prepared I thought I was , arriving in a big and bustling city still came as a bit of a shock . The first thing that caught me off guard was the great difference in material culture between our meek little town and the raucous American city . In our town , old folks went to a familiar coffee shop for a cup of afternoon coffee . In America sidewalks were filled with coffee shops --- lots and lots of coffee shops that never seemed to run out of people . In our town , vehicles cruised our streets . In America , streets were brimming with cars , buses and taxis that were all coursing the streets in an ly chaotic fashion . In our town , houses were quaint and warm . In America , buildings seemed cold and intimidating

While everyone in our town seemed to have the time to stop by each shop and catch up on everyone else 's business , people in America seemed to be always in a hurry and moved at an almost running pace . Just like their buildings , people in America wore clothes that struck me as cold and intimidating since I had been used to seeing people wearing their best dresses only on Sundays in church . I came across quite a number of gentlemen who wore almost the same set of clothes that our Town Mayor wore when he welcomed a number of dignitaries to our town . I would learn later on that these were gentlemen whose monthly earnings far exceeded some of my townspeople 's lifetime income

The other thing that really made me realize the fact that I was in a whole different country was the language . I regularly watched American movies back in our town...