Hey everyone!
Dana here, and on this Ask An American, I'm going to be talking about my experience living
in a country that has different time zones in it.
I'm still a little bit jet lagged after my last trip to the U.S. I just got back a couple
days ago, and so time zones are on my brain.
So how many time zones are there, actually, in the U.S.?
Well the states of the United States of America are spread out in 6 different time zones.
The Eastern Time Zone on the eastern coast, then the Central Time Zone, then the Mountain
Time Zone, then the Pacific Time Zone.
And then Alaska is in, what a name, the Alaskan Time Zone, and Hawaii is in Hawaiian Time Zone.
I grew up on the East Coast, so I lived in the Eastern Time Zone.
And actually for most of my life, living in a country that had multiple time zones in it,
really didn't affect me that much.
I do remember that as a kid, when there would be a TV promo for an upcoming show, they would
say something like: be sure not to miss such and such show at 9/8 Central on Saturday.
And that's how they would phrase it: at 9/8 Central.
And that meant that the show would play in the Eastern Time Zone at 9 and in the Central
Time Zone at 8.
And then the Mountain and the Pacific time zones would air the show separately, because
it would just be too early for those places to air the show at 7 and 6 o'clock.
And I would say the next time that I really gave much thought to the fact that the country
I lived in had different times zones in it was when I was about 14 and I started getting
more interested in political elections.
And I learned that the outcome of the election can be changed by the fact that the country
has different time zones in it; that that outcome can be affected by it.
Because when the polls close on the East Coast, and those results are announced in the news,
the polls on the West Coast are still very much open.
And I guess some people on the West Coast or in the other time zones where the polls
are still open, hear the results from the East Coast and then, I don't know, get kind
of, like, demotivated or they think, well I guess my vote doesn't really matter now.
They just figure there's no point in going to vote, and so some people who would have
voted, perhaps, after hearing the results from the East Coast maybe decide not to go vote.
This can even happen in state elections as well.
So there are some states in the U.S. that are split between the time zones, and it has
happened that an election occurred, and, you know, the polls closed in one half of the state,
and those results were broadcast, and then the winner won by a very small margin,
and then people were saying, like, well maybe it was the fact that the results in half of
the state were broadcast, and that kind of discouraged people in the other half of the
state from even going to vote.
And so maybe they say the outcome would have been different if those results from one half
of the state hadn't been broadcast until the other half of the state was done voting as well.
And living in the U.S., yes I grew up on the East Coast, but I did travel from time to
time into some of the other time zones, but still, I, I just would say, I didn't really
notice the time change that much when I did that.
Of course I had to change my watch or my phone or whatever.
But it was just a few hours.
I didn't really feel any kind of jet lag.
And I was just there for vacation, so it's not like it really affected, um, chatting
with my parents or anything like that.
But I did really notice the different time zones in the U.S. once more when I moved to Europe.
And my parents lived on the East Coast, and so they were 6 hours behind me.
But I had a friend who lived in California, and so she was 9 hours behind me.
And while I found that it was pretty okay to find a time to chat with my parents 6 hours
behind me, it was crazy with my friend in California because she would be waking up,
and my day would be pretty much coming to a close.
And so, to find a time to chat; it was just a little bit harder to find time when, yeah,
when our schedules lined up with that time change.
And also now when I travel back the U.S., now my parents live in Colorado, which is
in the Mountain Time Zone.
And so now they are 8 hours behind me.
Before when my parents lived on the East Coast, yeah, I had a little bit of jet lag when I
came back here to Germany...but, if I remember correctly, I really--I don't remember it being so bad.
And maybe it's just that, you know, I'm getting older, but I really feel like when my parents
lived in Florida, and they were just 6 hours behind me, I really remember the jet lag being
a lot less extreme than it is now.
I know it's just from 6 to 8 hours, but still I really feel like it takes more time, and
it's a much more extreme adjustment than just the 6 hours from the East Coast.
When Mr. German Man and I were dating, I went home, back to Florida a few times for Christmas
and New Year's, and so of course over New Year's he was in Germany, I was in the U.S.,
so he actually went into the next year before me.
And so it was 6 o'clock, 6 p.m. my time, midnight his time, but then he stayed up on the phone
with me or stayed up until 6 a.m. his time to celebrate New Year's with me in the U.S.
So I thought that was pretty sweet.
Something else interesting, just as far as time in general goes: so just like Germany,
the U.S. does also do daylight savings time.
But did you know that the U.S. and Germany switch to summer and winter times on different days?
I didn't realize that until I moved here.
I just figured, everyone would probably switch on the same day.
This year for example, the U.S. switched to summer time on March 13 and will switch back
to winter time on November 6.
Whereas in Germany, we switched to summer time on March 27 and we will switch back to
winter time on October 30.
So actually, overall, the U.S. will end up spending this year 21 more days in summer
time than here in Germany.
So my question for you is: how have different time zones affected you in your life, and
please what is your best cure for jet lag?
Please let me know in the comments below.
Thanks so much fro watching.
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Until next time, auf Wiedersehen!
They would say something like: don't forget to miss...uh, don't forget to see. Don't forget to miss the show.
I can remember that as a kid, when there would be a promo for a television sh...show. Television show.
Television show, that's a tongue twister!
I'm done.