Aren't you standing a little too close to me....?

Two posts in one day! Aren't you lucky??

I just have to get something out there. And this isn't a complaint against Israel, rather it's something that I find extremely unsettling that is common to many other foreign cultures. I'm talking about the whole personal space issue. Today I was using my computer, sitting on the floor with another person when someone came up to tell us that we couldn't be in the room. Instead of just standing there and talking in our direction, this person chose to sit directly in front of us, learned towards us and lectured us in such close proximity that we could almost feel his beard stubble touching our faces. Okay, that's exagerrating, but not by much. I leaned back because I felt extremely uncomfortable, and this asshole took that as a cue to lean even more forward.

Even more unsettling is the practice of some of the students here to kiss everyone upon seeing them for the first time in the morning and seeing them for the last time before going to bed. I mean, they're all extremely nice people and I'm looking forward to becoming friends with them, but I completely freaked out when, at the end of the first day before going to bed, some girl from a country with this practice grabbed my face and kissed my cheeks. I did not outwardly freak out, but it was a desperate inward struggle to stop myself from spazzing out as much as my dog does when you turn her over onto her back.

I'm not really sure what I'm going to do. I mean, I come from the school of thought that the only people you kiss upon seeing are old friends that you stumble upon at a party or who have come to your house for dinner (and this is only if you are true adult, not when you're in your early 20's), and that all conversations should be conducted with enough space in the middle to fit a football field. Maybe that's why Americans are known for being so friggin' loud.