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Reverse Culture Shock

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Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#71

Post by astrodust »

wtbob wrote: post #47
55555 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very true! In the same vein though, the selection at places like Whole Foods is one of the best parts of coming home (from the third world). One of the hardest things for me to adapt to is how "liberal" America has become. It's not an objectively bad thing, but I feel like I went into a coma and woke up 20 years later in a world I can barely relate to. As an example, I'm thinking about stuff like Miley Cyrus' perform…

> One of the hardest things for me to adapt to is how "liberal" America has become. It's not an objectively bad thing One wonders, if the rest of the world is more cautious about this sort of thing, if maybe it's America that's in the wrong. Maybe other cultures deal with these things more sensitively or more rationally or just better . My experience travelling abroad is that people seem more comfortable in their ski…

> My experience travelling abroad...

Try doing that with a disability, being a visible minority, being a woman, etc.

America is far from perfect, but it's at least accommodating. In other countries they don't hesitate to throw people to the curb.

It's the little things: The wheelchair accessible stores and streets, the effort made to deal with vision impairments, institutions that are fighting for women's rights and so on. There are some places in the world where people with disabilities do not seem to exist, they're always hidden away.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#72

Post by jschwartzi »

icefox wrote: post #54
bandrami wrote: post #3

Yup. I'm a "trailing spouse" for an American diplomat, and this is so true. One thing that always, always, always happens to Americans when we repatriate is the "grocery store freakout". At some point, you will go to a grocery store, and freeze. "Man..." you'll keep saying, "Americans really love breakfast cereal..."

A very unexpected reversal of that was upon returning I quickly realized that the various candy and snack food I had come to enjoy while living abroad in Norway just flat out don't exists in the U.S. While there I would pick up random stuff now and then and over time found favorites. While there is 100 feet of cereal it is only a few big companies and each individual choice is even given sometimes 3 feet of space. So…

I've noticed that the more skilled I've gotten at cooking, the less useful the 90% of the store that isn't raw vegetables, meat, and grain is.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#73

Post by Rapzid »

holdenc wrote: post #35

Why call it reverse culture shock? It's simply a realization that the United States not the best country in every regard. And in many regards it's failing badly. Personally, I call it the I-can't-get-healthcare shock, or the I-can-only-find-chain-restaurants-in-flyover-country shock, or the NYC-subway-is-not-as-nice-as-the-Asian-country-train-system-I-just-left shock.

A lot of people have downvoted you; I'm not sure if it's the way you delivered your point, that they don't understand because they haven't been through it, or don't understand these things can constitute more subtle cultural differences than they typically envision.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#74

Post by vacri »

JacobAldridge wrote: post #56

The old adage is that a man can never step into the same stream twice; for it is not the same stream, and he is not the same man. Stepping back home (in our case, moving back to Australia after 2+ years living in London) is much the same - you have changed, and home has changed, but you don't expect either to be different. I think a big part is expectations. When we left, we were expecting something different, unusua…

A Greek friend of mine said of the Greek diaspora here in Melbourne that when they came out post-war, they became 'hyper-Greek' as a coping mechanism, embracing their culture more fully. They then travel back to Greece for whatever reason, and complain about how decadent it's become.

Of course, he says, Greece hasn't really changed, it's just that now the ex-pats are seeing it through the lens of being 'hyper-Greek' now.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#76

Post by bravo22 »

nickbauman wrote: post #44

A German-born American with 11 years total living in Germany. Almost all of it with the iron curtain in place. A white guy, I now live in a neighborhood that's 3/4 black, 10% Hmong for 16 years, I feel very normal being permanently out-of-place. In Germany I am the "Amerikanischer". Here it's "he's German". But I'm permanently alone in a crowd, too. Always on the outside looking in. Suspicious of the herd. Skeptical…

I had similar upbringing and I can say I feel the same. Definitely something to be said about being averse to groupthink.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#77

Post by Rapzid »

I'm a NZ permanent resident and moved back after nearly 5 years living there. My shock is mostly politically related; I'm hyper aware of the polarized nature of the country now as well as the lack of understanding of UHC. The inability of our government to streamline and adopt modern technologies into the governance process(downsize), hyperbole and rhetoric on both sides, etc.

Re: Reverse Culture Shock

#80

Post by Rapzid »

jessaustin wrote: post #66
rhizome wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Man..." you'll keep saying, "Americans really love breakfast cereal..." Though it's true to some degree, I wouldn't go that far. My sense is that the higher the margin on a product or product-line, the more money the manufacturer and distributors have to purchase shelf space. Cereal, Chips, Crackers, Ice Cream, Mayonnaise. The last time I was at the store I counted 21 separate varieties of Triscuit, 10-12 flavors ov…

That explains too much... why aren't high-margin products in other developed nations' grocery stores treated the same way? Or, if they are, why isn't breakfast cereal one of them? Perhaps because Americans really love breakfast cereal ?

It's possible the margins are not as high, or they are not as high vs other more popular products. It could be a combination of multiple factors at play. Certainly if nobody was buying cereals in the US the high margins would not be enough to sustain shelf-space spending, so that's a valid point.
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