Ryan Ariano The author, Ryan Ariano, moved from LA to the small town of Victor, Idaho, and noticed some major cultural differences between the two places.
- I moved from Los Angeles to a town of just 2,260 people in Idaho.
- Moving from a major US city to a small town came with many culture shocks, from the popularity of hunting and rodeo to the nature of local politics.
- Here were some of the biggest culture shocks I've had to adjust to since moving.
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In January 2013, my wife and I left a balmy 70-degree morning in Hollywood with all our earthly possessions condensed into a pickup truck and a CR-V.
After close to a decade living in Orange County and Los Angeles, we'd decided to take a break from the traffic, the crowds, and the stress of competitive, busy coastal cities. Our destination was the rural town of Victor, Idaho, in the Rocky Mountain West, population 2,260.
A day later we arrived at our small, one-bedroom cabin on a minus-23-degree day. Our pipes were frozen and the baseboard heaters struggled to heat the place up.
As we began to wonder whether we'd made a mistake, and if we would ever feel warm again, much less make it a whole winter, our neighbor walked over with a massive load of split firewood and welcomed us to the neighborhood. I tried to give him some cash but he waved his hands - he seemed embarrassed by my thanks, as if to say, "Why wouldn't I help out a neighbor in need?"
Thus began our new life in the small mountain enclave that we now call home.
There were a lot of cultural differences I noticed immediately after moving from the most sprawling city in the US to a town of a couple thousand people. As time went on, I realized that some of those preliminary observations were right on, while others only scratched the surface of very complex cultural differences.
These are the the biggest culture shocks I encountered after I moved from LA to a tiny town of just over 2,000 people.