I’m from the islands and I moved to America about seven years ago.
It’s been a really interesting transition to integrate into an entirely different culture than what I am used to.
Some of the changes have been really pleasant and inviting, but there are some things that have been quite challenging to get used to. One thing that has been a culture shock is the amount of air conditioning that everyone uses here. On the island, air conditioning is a rare thing that you may come across. The weather there is so perfectly balanced that you really don’t need air conditioning throughout the entire year. Some commercial businesses would have air conditioning, like restaurants, but they didn’t even need to have the temperature set too low. In America, it seems like everyone is obsessed with freezing cold air conditioning. When I bought my first house here, I met with a local air conditioning technician to go over different options for a house air conditioning system. He was shocked when I said I only wanted one window AC unit, especially since I live in a Southern state. He talked me into getting a multi split air conditioner. To be honest, it’s very rare that I use all of the air conditioning units because I feel that just one of them does the trick and cools down the house to my liking. Whenever I visit a friend’s house, they know to turn the thermostat up a little bit just before I get there. I don’t like cold air conditioning because I think it feels synthetic. Not being blasted with cold air is definitely something I miss about the island.