Growing up American?

I’ve been taking some time in the evenings and on weekends to catch up with my old life and old friends in the UK by e-mail and various calls. One question I often get is whether I have yankee accent yet. Am I speaking Americanese English yet? Well, I have a few friends at the GSB who update and watch whether I’ve begun to lose the accent, and so far, not so noticeable- it’s hard to change an accent that has been built up over 11 years from the age of 13. I am beginning to speak Americanese, there is no way I can say words like ‘Bathroom’ here without referring to the right accent tone.

The biggest change for me in the last year has definitely been in my behaviors- yesterday on my way into work, I had a huge craving for Starbucks coffee, and as I self-reflected in the queue, I realized that I had become one of them- a serious coffee drinking American machine! I should start to be conscieous about whose coffee I drink to ensure I support third world coffee farmers…

All this means a confusing time for me, as I approach my 25^th birthday, I start to wonder about what my real identity is. I would describe myself as a Tanzanian at heart- generous, simple , quiet and cooperative- or am I a guy who prefers to sit in quiet pubs by the fire in winter and in the beer garden at night sipping ale or lager that gets all exited and disappointed by the England football team like a true brit? The other day I found a drum and bass club in Seattle and I was sooo excited, as drum and bass is a music genre I’d grown to love in my time in the Southwest of England- do I still appreciate this music or am I increasingly becoming addicted to commercial hip-hop?

Clearly, like I morphed into the British culture beginning some 12 years ago, there is a level of Americanism that that will be part of me now and moving forward. It’s also easy to forget, how diverse America really is, more diverse than the UK in many ways and it is hence more tolerable and accepting of diverse people. The march to Stanford GSB begun a while back now, and I don’t think I really put much thought into how much the American culture would influence me- although I was well aware that I would go through one hell of an experience.

Yesterday, I ended the day with a talk Microsoft arranged on house buying should we return to the area full-time. Yes, it is premature given that I haven’t even reached my mid-point review to receive the ‘on-track’ signal, but so was going to Bill Gates’ house on Day one … The housing talk was a good info session, but I felt pressured into action- “buy, buy, get into the property market! Settle down- You’re Growing up!’’ Decision, decisions, I’m a small boy entering a grown up world…