Disclaimer: the below contains information that is yet to be proven scientifically.
Culture shock is an experience
similar to muscle fatigue. We know what causes it: similarly to aching muscles,
culture shock emerges when you do something you’ve never done before, or at
least for a very long time. For instance, travel to a different country,
different continent, different culture. In these cases, it isn’t the quads or
biceps that are being worked extra, but parts of our brains. By default, it’s a
pleasant activity: it feels refreshing to shake up those lazy cells a bit. This
is the time when you marvel at the odd signs on billboards, at the red buses
driving on the wrong side of the road, the unknown yet good-looking pastries,
when you stare at seas, mountains, cities, plains with awe.
Then, just like muscles when they
are overworked, the head starts feeling discomfort. Wall climbing is fun for
only so long, after which you’d like to ease the ache of the muscles;
similarly, the fascinating new environment can easily become exhausting. All
that novelty starts to get irritating, and you wish that everything worked the
way you’re used to it, so you can get some rest.
Culture shock isn’t only that
it’s always summer and you have to drive on the wrong side, that there isn’t
running water, sometimes not even electricity. It’s also a culture shock
feature when nobody tells you which door to use to get on the bus, do you have
to hail it down, can you pay with bills or do you need half a kilo of coins to
buy your ticket.
It’s part of culture shock to not
know if your latte is indeed called latte, or it has some odd local name, one
that could translate to upside down, broken, Russian, or creamy coffee. When
you have to do a full tap dance performance in the bathroom to figure out
whether the faucet works on sensors requiring movement, voice, or the
appropriate facial expression.
Culture shock isn’t only when you
get yelled at on the street “Muzungu”. It’s also when the bus driver addresses
everybody getting on the bus as “darling”, and those getting off only get
spared because they use the back door. It’s when all your professors are
referred to by their first name. When the cashier asks you how you are but
doesn’t wait for the answer – they would have the time though, since part of
culture shock is not understanding the local coins and taking forever fishing
out the right amount from your wallet.
Culture shock isn’t only when
you’re in a place you don’t speak the language of. It’s also when you’re
somewhere you in principle should be able to, yet you have no idea what the
neighbour said although they were visibly very excited about it.
Culture shock isn’t only the
unknown and suspicious fruits on the local market. It’s also having to learn
where the market even is, which store is cheaper, what that fruit is, which
garbage bin is for recycling paper. That what they call a tram is really a
cable car. Or what they call a cable car is really a tram. How big are the
beds, and in what order you have to pile up the utterly confusing system of
pillows and blankets, which also have names that have nothing to do with “pillow”
and “blanket”. To learn whether life stops on Sundays, or on the contrary,
everything can be scheduled for any hour of any day.
Culture shock is like sore
muscles. It fades away after a while if you keep working the same muscles. But
if you mix up your workout routine, and move into a new environment, all that
training was for nothing, body and mind notice the change immediately. If you
jump around between tropical and concrete jungles, better to accept that some
soreness will be permanently present. Sometimes in the head, other times in
other body parts.
Nincsenek megjegyzések:
Megjegyzés küldése