Dating an American - An Intercultural Love Story

Intercultural dating often feels like you are traveling internationally every day. Your mind gets expanded in ways you would have never expected... frequently out of your comfort zone.  When I came to the U.S. for the first time at the age of 19, I had just finished high school in northern Germany. Like many 19 year olds in Germany, I had spent my free-time ballroom dancing, working part-time at a club on the weekends and often spent the night at a friend‘s house - no matter if they were a male or female friend of mine.  When I moved to Grand Rapids , Michigan, to study at Calvin College (a Private Christian school) I was confronted with a very different everyday life: suddenly I was not allowed to serve or even drink alcohol, I had to differentiate between girl and guy friendships and obey open-hours (allotted dorm times for opposite genders to be in each other’s rooms). Somehow, even ballroom dancing seemed to be a luxurious hobby that people my age couldn’t affor...

Initially , I was going to blog about something completely different today. And then the thing with the pigeon happened... After a really long and hot summer day, I found an  injured pigeon  in the backyard of the apartment complex I live in. I took a closer look: It was young and couldn't move. My initial response was somewhere between: "Just leave it, it will probably be fine" and "If it's severely hurt, I can't help it anyway." I was one step from turning my back on it... from looking away... from continuing my day because I found logical excuses why I should not be  required to help .  But then I realized something:  Before Jon and I started dating , friends of ours challenged whether or not it was a smart idea for us to date:  The long distance; me being a  world traveler ; Jon having been a  party animal  in the recent past; both of us just having ended relationships and trying to get our lives back in order. Believe m...