confront/interact with a culture different from my own

I come from a small city in Wisconsin of about 15,000 people. Most of which are white middle class citizens, a couple hundred mexicans, some asians and very few blacks. When I lived in Minneapolis there were quite a few whites, blacks, asians and so on and so forth, but I attended that Art Institute International Minnesota and the majority of the students were middle class or rich white people. I was never really given the chance to interact with other cultures and experience there way of life.

I moved to Chicago a couple months ago and I have been so overwhelmed and caught of guard with all different cultures. Truthfully I was a little intimidated and scared at first and I still am. But I feel so privileged to be able to be exposed to all these different cultures, it’s unreal. Back home in Wisconsin you would never get this unless you lived in Milwaukee or Madison but even then it would be to this extent.

I changed roommates a couple weeks into the semester because my first one was extremely mean and I wanted to rip her face off. (haha can’t help it, it you knew her you would totally understand and would want to do the same.) I was then placed into a room that I am in right now. My roommate is from Maryland and she’s black... and yes at first I was a little nervous because I had never had to live with someone from another culture or race, I didn’t know what to expect and didn’t want to say anything that would offend her, at times I tend to just say shit and I don’t pay attention to the words that I’m saying and they can be kinda racy if you taken the wrong way. After a week or so I was fine and I have been so intrigued by her and her families background. My vocabulary has changed a bit, thank goodness. I’m so used to being around a bunch of colored open minded individuals that when I went home for easter I was going crazy because people from home are so annoying now and they don’t understand what I’m talking about...