Culture shock 1

I had just arrived in US from Africa and went with my white host to do some shopping at a local chain store.
People were standing a long queues to pay the cashiers jsut like in Africa but what was surpring was the distance/ space left between any two people in a queue.
I came to learn that that was "personal space."
Where I came from, we pretty much breathed onto each others necks in shopping malls.
I came across some interesting definitions of personal space from Webster's:


Main Entry:
personal space2
Part of Speech:
n
Definition:
the space reached by the human body's extremities while stationary, also called kinesphere


Main Entry:
personal space1
Part of Speech:
n
Definition:
the sense of invisible boundaries around an individual body and separating one from others, the encroachment of which may cause anxiety, cf. intimate space

I am now very aware of peronal spaces to the extent that when I visited my country recently a lot of my friends thought am a little bit "stand-offish"

Lesson 1.

Chite