Change

The biggest thing that I have noticed about Africa thus far is the fact that life is so different than ours over in Canada. It was something that was expected, but what surprises me is how in many ways it is so different, BUT there are also some ways that life here is so similar to that in Canada.

The biggest difference that I have been finding is how relaxed and (dare I say it, but with lack of a better word) “unscheduled” life is here as compared to what it is like at home. At home the pressure to ensure that you get ten million things done in a day is a part of daily life, but here a totally different attitude exists. This attitude seems to always be “if not today, then tomorrow”. There never seems to be a set time for anything, and if this time is set it often gets pushed back or forgotten and moved to another time when it is remembered. I am grateful that I somehow managed to lose my day planner because if I hadn’t I am sure that I would be much more bothered by the fact that life is so unscheduled as compared to what I have grown accustom to. I am mostly grateful for this way of life, because I am such a procrastinator that it seems like the way I would normally do things day to day is more acceptable here than it was at home. And as a side note, I am not in any way bashing this ideal, but even with my procrastination, it is still something that is foreign and different than what I am used to and it will most definitely need some getting used to.

What I do love about this place is that the basis of what they do here is ultimately the same as it is at home. Every person here is striving to live up to their full ability. People work hard to do what they need to accomplish, but it is just done at a different pace and in a different manner. I guess what I can conclude is that human beings are set out to find the same means to their ends, we just all do it in a different way. And here, it is in definite contrast to what I am used to back in Canada.

The bonus to this different way of life is the fact that I am able to live it and (eventually) become accustom to a different culture by becoming adapted to their different way of life. The only way to fully experience another culture is by living the way that they do. And I think with enough experience of this new lifestyle I can become accustom to this culture through living it every day.