This was called repatriation shock,
surprised to see its placed here on state.gov
Reverse Culture Shock
141–150 of 187 posts
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#142Another phenomena that can creep up on well-traveled folks is "the curse of the traveller" (obviously not a technical term, but I've not heard another name for it).
Essentially, you subconciously collect "likes" about each place where you spend a sufficient amount of time.
The food in this place, the coffee shops somewhere else, a street market culture here, the women/men there. A language, the climate, pace of life and attitudes from other places.
With time, the mind constructs its own personal Shangri-la (which contains _all_of these things) and you, explicitly and/or implicitly, spend the rest of your life dissatisfied with the delta on your actual experience.
In practice, for me this has been more of an "ah... that's happening, heh" thing that I observe going on in the mind rather than a difficult-to-live-with curse.
I'm curious, however, what the effects will look like another 10 or 20 years in. I suspect it could grow worse with age as we are able to travel and do less? That's hopefully just a matter of managing perspective, though.
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#143Another phenomena that can creep up on well-traveled folks is "the curse of the traveller" (obviously not a technical term, but I've not heard another name for it). Essentially, you subconciously collect "likes" about each place where you spend a sufficient amount of time. The food in this place, the coffee shops somewhere else, a street market culture here, the women/men there. A language, the climate, pace of life…
It can be a positive when people bring back the stuff they found better when abroad.
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
Coming back from India and going to Walmart. so much space with nobody in it. Everything you need to live under one giant roof. There's 4 people at 4 registers and no line for any of them.
> There's 4 people at 4 registers and no line for any of them. We are definitely not going to the same Walmart. EDIT: To clarify, I know this is one of Walmart's strengths, but it doesn't improve my experience.
At my nearest Walmart, the 12-items-or-less "fast" lane is also the exclusive tobacco products lane which totally defeats the purpose. Buying cigarettes is also a recursive game of 20 Questions about brand, size, filter, we-don't-have-that-do-you-want-this-instead? Okay, brand, size, filter...
(And I see you'll be paying in pennies.)
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've heard this is indeed often the case, emigrants embracing their home culture in a more fundamental way. Maybe the imagined state of one's culture is often that of the grandparents' time, always a bit behind of the reality.
British expats certainly are notorious(+) for doing this - epitomising some kind of Imperial Britain that may not even have existed when they were born. The most ridiculous subset are those people who live in Spain and complain about "immigrants" in Daily Mail comments. They may be in for a surprise if the hard Brexit they supported happens and they lose their right to reside in Spain because the UK won't guarantee r…
Calling them British Expats does not help. They're migrants (weather migrants I like to call them when someone mentions "economic migrants") and live in a mental -and often physical- ghetto.
The problem is that a big majority of them does not speak the language and, in case of creation of a points visa like some Brexiteers want for migrants coming to the UK, they will fail due to their lack of integration.
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#146I lived 3 years in the UK, and now I am back in Denmark for a while, I hope to return, but lets see what Theresa May & co figures out. I always thought I wanted to go for the dual-citizenship, but not anymore. It is difficult to live in a new place, you don't really feel integrated even though you have friends, speak the language, go to events, pay your taxes, and get the jokes, you will always be the dane and a fore…
> ... my thoughts and language is some sort of strange danish/british amalgamation, and I feel like a foreigner ...
Perhaps the term "a broader perspective" is how to describe it?
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
America should not be comparing itself to developing nations, but other developed nations. In that they fall short in many things.
I've lived in Austria for (almost) 8 years and Germany for a bit over 3 - I really like both for many reasons and neither could really be accused of being a developing nation. Wheelchair accessibility is simply not a thing here, not even in Vienna and Berlin (let alone small towns or rural areas). E.g. you will often find the bathrooms in restaurants or cafes to not be accessible without going up or down a bunch of s…
Even the UN building in Vienna isn't fully wheelchair or vision impaired accessible, which kind of surprised me.
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#148I lived 3 years in the UK, and now I am back in Denmark for a while, I hope to return, but lets see what Theresa May & co figures out. I always thought I wanted to go for the dual-citizenship, but not anymore. It is difficult to live in a new place, you don't really feel integrated even though you have friends, speak the language, go to events, pay your taxes, and get the jokes, you will always be the dane and a fore…
As an American, I experience almost (not to same degree, but same kind) when I visit Kansas where I grew up. I now live in Washington, and the two states in the same country are entire worlds apart. The people I know in Kansas, I can tell that my thinking has changed a bunch in a multitude of dimensions.
Western Washington or Eastern Washington?
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've met a few people who moved across continents in their youth, sometimes multiple times. Almost without a fault, they are somewhat obsessed with the concept of 'home'. My longest time abroad was a year in Chicago, and the place where I grew up is far too boring to ever be considered 'home', so I really have no idea where 'home' would be for me. But I'm largely just indifferent to the idea. FWIW: I have many Americ…
Plenty of folks in the LGBT community have this feeling as well - rejection or a feeling of not belonging from where one comes from touches most of my friends there. There's communities, cities and cultures that people attach to, and many people trying to find what home means.
This is why the furry community is majority LGBT+. I went to my first furry convention last year, and it was like coming home. Furry Twitter is close, but doesn't quite match it. I'm going to my first Pride later this year, so I'll have something demographically similar to compare with.
Re: Reverse Culture Shock
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
If you look around enough, you may find many "international stores" that stock on foods sourced....Internationally. Of course, the Indian/Chinese stores are a class in themselves, but you can also find the odd store that stocks products imported from Turkey or Germany etc. This is MUCH easier in a big city of course. Houston is surprisingly good in this regard: not only can you find all kinds of groceries, but the re…
Scandinavians living abroad are known to visit IKEA to get a taste of home. It's almost impossible to get any of the products abroad. Which makes sense, there's not that many of us.