To be completely out of my element, to feel helpless and hopelessly unprepared and completely ignorant, to be forced to ask questions to crotchety old locals, to speak more with my hands and motions than with my voice, to grow in my ability to be as uncomfortable as possible for as long as possible…these were characteristics high on my list when deciding upon a city to stake my exchange year.

I declare this as my intention, and yet, you ask, why did I choose Europe? Why did I choose the region of the world that most closely emulates American-Western civilization? Despite what one might think, Graz, Austria has it’s fair share of unbeknownst culture shocks which have definitely yielded the aforementioned characteristics. I’ll go ahead and share four biggies with you.

• Language Barrier

This was most likely pretty obvious for you. Austrians speak German and Josie does not. It doesn’t actually matter how much German one learns prior to studying in Austria. The Austrian dialect makes it so that it’s it’s own language to the untrained ear. To a monolingual American student who has only studied German for a year now, the Austrian German might as well be an entirely different language from the Hochdeutsch I am familiar with.

I got so excited after the German Intensive Programs to apply my knowledge. Just learned thorough Restaurant vocab! Let’s go out to eat!” My excitement soon fades when I recall the difference between the words I learn in Hochdeutsch German Intensive Classes and the Austrian dialect.

2. The Recycling Obsession

I was kidding myself when I thought that I had any talent concerning recycling back in the States.

Everything can be separated here in Austria, and in fact everything is recyclable. It’s so intense that I didn’t actually throw anything away for the first two weeks because I was worried Austrians would come chase me down waving picket signs reading “Destroyer of the Worlds!!” And “You Are The Apocalypse!”

I finally tracked down a jolly “What Can You Recycle?” sign in English that I can tack up on the wall by the recycling bins in our flat.

3. International Awareness

Austrians know more about the American party system, about the refugee situation in Syria, about the Australian prime minister, about Russian diplomacy, more about really anything than seemingly do the natives in each respective land. Or maybe it’s all relative to barely-informed me and I’m exaggerating that by quite a bit.

Nevertheless, Austrians are impressively informed about the way that the world is going about outside of Europe. I have had many an Austrian come ask me about my take on the decapitation incident in the water park in Kansas City. To this I often grunt, “Hmm. Yes. Sad. Very.” And the Austrian walks away shaking his head muttering what sounds very similar in tone to “Bloody fool” but in Austrian-German so I can’t understand.

4. The Metric System

I honestly lament the fact that America doesn’t use the metric system. Seriously. Why don’t we hop on board the Rest-of-the-World train and Manifest-Destiny our way towards the metric system? It would make life a load easier.

Quite obviously there are loads more cultural differences between Graz, Austria and bustling Emporia, Kansas–no air conditioning, no dryers (everyone hangs the washing out to dry), pedestrians can and will cross the street with the green man sign illuminated and say a blanket “to hell with the cars!” As they stroll along, etc–but to simplify I only offer four.