by Meriam Raouf STAFF WRITER

Until being described as “tense” on a bus in Maryland, I can’t say I was truly aware of the huge cultural differences. Before spending a significant amount of time in Maryland and immediately following that New York City, I thought the difference would be like that between regular and Honey Nut Cheerios. Boy was I wrong. Comparing the cultures of the two places is like comparing a stiletto to a flip flop.

When we first rode the bus in Ocean City (yeah I said bus, singular. There’s only one bus route, because there’s one main street—be shocked) it was like seeing something glow-in-the-dark for the first time. We didn’t understand how or why it was created, and honestly, we weren’t sure how to respond the first time. I had no idea I was bred with this etiquette until I saw some Marylandians with the opposite view.

I’m used to riding the bus and taking public transportation. I am not, however, used to people communicating with me for the very sake of doing so. In New York, if someone is talking to you they are a) poisoning you with anthrax b) robbing you c) selling you something. In Maryland and more rural places, it’s normal for human beings to communicate with one another. As if it’s the dinner table.

My responses to the friendliness on the bus phased into less cynical, but there was definitely a threshold. At first I clutched my pepper spray and answered the question. The second time I was met with the deadly act of spontaneous niceness I tried to answer the question politely. The third time I was even ambitious enough to attempt to strike up a conversation but my face automatically switched to the New York City sneer I’ve been trained to make on public transportation. I didn’t mean to—it’s just how I was raised to act.

There’s more than just the willingness or unwillingness to make elevator conversation that’s different in both cultures. There’s even “bus posture” as my friend and I have come to call it. Next time you sit down on a bus, if your bag is on your lap, you’re not smiling, you refuse to make eye contact or God forbid any body contact, chances are your license reads “NEW YORK STATE” (or somewhere near it—the NYC skepticism spreads). There’s also the I’m-better-than-you-because-i-carry-a-metro-card-and-never-need-to-look-at-the-subway-map mentality that comes with this and believe me, even if you’re from Jersey, it’s hard to wipe that off.

Having spent a week amongst the friendlies, I have to admit, I wanted to go home to my polluted, noisy, rude, dangerous city. But after further thinking about it, I’m having trouble deciding what the better way for society to function is. I would love to close the skitzo-tastic argument the two characters in my head (it’s cute one’s a rural Elmo and the other is a city Elmo---don’t ask me why Elmo, maybe because he comes in everything) by using a Grandpa phrase “that’s like comparing apples and oranges” but it ain’t that easy. Because a culture is formed by the people, that makes a culture changeable. It complicates the equation when an apple can transform into an orange, now doesn’t it?

Every once in a while in the city, I will come across a “Bless You” when one sneezes, a real tan, from the actual sun or even two people cursing off the same guy, which just proves that although the city is rough, the people who live there share a common thought. That thought is “don’t take it personally.” And when the bus driver doesn’t get thanked when he drops people off, or the waiter doesn’t get tipped, they use that mantra. And it makes for a great contrast when something genuinely “nice” (look it up New Yorkers) does come along.

There’s the other side of the coin. Why not just be pleasant all the time? People like the Marylandians (we’ve taken to referring to them as that) just generally enjoy learning about other people in an upfront kinda way. They enjoy giving each other directions and communicating with strangers. There’s a different kind of polite.

No one who’s used to how it is feels hurt by how it is. And that makes it sound like the ghetto, but I felt out of place where people talked to each other in public. And where there was so much public trust. It was like a salt-water fish jumping in the lake for a week.

So maybe Grandpa was right. Maybe it is like apples and oranges. In that case, bring on the cornucopia.