Culture Shock

I almost cried tonight.

Standing on the roof of San Francisco’s Intercontinental, a full sushi and dumpling spread laid out, not to mention a very open bar, I stood talking to a CEO of a start up tech company, one that had already been priced at the millions upon millions of dollars. We discussed the best business strategy for acquiring other companies. I have no idea what that strategy is, however, that didn’t seem to hinder our conversation. He had no problem waxing on about the fine art of acquisition.

After three hours of milling and mingling we all took town cars to a swanky back alley restaurant. Who knew that a meat packing house could be so modern? Sleek and shiny and almost unforgivably cool, I felt like an impostor  wobbling in my 5 inch heels and my little black dress that I recently picked up from a sale rack.

Many, many, many more drinks later we finally sat for dinner at 10:30pm. There was lots of shop talk and networking and general friendliness. All of a sudden I looked down at my place setting and actually realized what I was seeing. In front of me sat three glasses of red wine (all different, all at varying heights), rustic French bread with goat butter, seared swordfish (the only thing on the menu that I could pronounce everything that came with it) and various other small bites provided as “compliments from the chef”

Exactly three weeks ago I was squatting on a street corner eating soup out of a plastic bowl served to me by a man with 5 teeth.

All of a sudden I was very tired.