He looked at me like I was the one who should run.
This is another song that I am not going to be able to relate to well as it is about the unrest that the band members grew up in while in Ireland. I have to admit extreme ignorance as to the detailed reasons for the violence in that part of the world at that time in history. I think the song is expressing the odd feeling of an Irish person in England (or vice versa) during that time. Though close to each other geographically, they were strangers to each other.
The only way I can relate to this is when the company I worked for in 2008 was bought by another, bigger company. In one day, we were supposedly part of this bigger group of employees but we still introduced ourselves by our name and the company we worked for before the acquisition. To some extend, 3 years later, it is still this way. I would not go so far as to say we were strangers (we have many things in common) but there was definitely an “us” and a “them”.
Those of us in the company that was purchased had to go through a little culture shock, to change the way we thought about many things that pertained to our jobs and how we performed them. We had to change our ways to fit in and do it quickly (or at least we thought we did). It took a year or two before feeling comfortable being myself in front of “them”.
I am currently reading a book called “Cultures and Organizations: Software for the Mind” in preparation of writing a white paper around the general area of the effects of culture and off shore resources and my parent group’s focus (sounds boring, eh?). It is a fascinating subject and the authors are obviously experts in this field. In dealing with so many cultures on a day to day basis in my current role, this should help me personally as well. I am sure I will share more as I get further in the book but you could say that one goal would be for me to help others that we deal with not to feel like strangers and also to feel less like strangers ourselves.
Jon
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