Memories: A Dane in Texas- This is NOT What I Expected!

When I was 20, I packed up my stuff and traveled across the world, from Copenhagen, Denmark to Austin, Texas.

You might wonder why anyone of sound mind would do such a thing, but it was time for me to get on with University after a two year break of being mostly a "Creative Slacker."

Well, that and I was very ready to put some serious distance between myself and my rather meddlesome family. I basically felt like I was suffocating...

Maybe that sounds dramatic, but I felt like I hadn't been allowed to have a thought of my own, in spite of having left home two years prior. Did I mention that my family was meddlesome...?

I am not sure exactly what I was expecting to encounter in Texas, but I had been told that the weather was "Mediterranean" and the people friendly, so off I went... in spite of the fact that most of my local friends headed to the States were going to California.

Well, Austin of 1981 was definitely not the shiny glass and chrome high-rise metropolis many Europeans associate with the USA... it was a slow moving smaller city.

I remember standing in the airport and pondering the fact that the were only six gates, making it the smallest I'd ever been to.

Very strange...

I definitely knew about fast food... but had no idea there would be so few alternatives to fast food, even if it were a college town! I also didn't understand why people thought me "weird" for buying and cooking my own food. It was much cheaper than eating out... yet few did it.

I was in Austin for all of maybe 10 days before the illusion of "Mediterranean" weather was shattered.

It was January and had been maybe 65 degrees (17C) when I went to class at noon... then a cold front blew in, and when I came out of the building at 5:00 in the afternoon it was 22 (-5C) and hailing! I had never experienced such abrupt weather changes, and felt half frozen by the time I made it back to my tiny studio apartment.

Later that summer, I would experience 105 degrees (42C) for the first time...

Another early surprise was the lack of public transportation. At first, I didn't understand why people felt so sorry for me for not having a car, but then I tried using the local bus. Yikes! Not only was it slow, but I quickly learned that "white people don't ride the bus."

This was 1981, not the 1950s...

It was not long... a matter of a couple of months, before I was desperate to go back to Europe.

But I stuck it out.

And nobody was more surprised than myself that I ended up living in Texas for over 20 years!

But I did; got a degree, got married, started a business... it was all a learning experience!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

How about you? Ever had an experience that was radically different from what you expected? Leave me a comment and be part of the conversation!

2023.07.18 02:59