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Boo hoo, I'm back from exchange/abroad and nobody appreciates me - Page 4

post #46 of 53
8/29/10 at 3:15pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by SField View Post
This only happens to stupid americans who previously had no culture whatsoever.
good point. This can be applied to stupid europeans as well
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post #47 of 53
8/29/10 at 3:27pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by GlenCoe View Post
good point. This can be applied to stupid europeans as well

Not as easily since they don't live in nearly as insulated an environment as americans do. They are used to less personal space, walking everywhere, speaking and understanding multiple languages, and all other sorts of things that create "culture shock" for americans.
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post #48 of 53
8/30/10 at 2:04am
Quote:
Originally Posted by impolyt_one View Post
Actually, one very noticeable thing I get is this: I usually spend a year or two (sometimes more) in Korea and then travel around Asia once in awhile for fun, and then when it's time to visit home, I stop in Tokyo, then have to pit stop in LA, Minneapolis, Detroit, etc, but I stay in the airport and it's usually light outside, so when I hit ground in St. Louis, it's always inevitably night time, and the first thing I notice is how incredibly dark it is in America.. American street lights just don't light up anything, and there's no signage or anything else that really lights up much, and tons of dark space in between. I am used to a zillion jigawatts of light blaring on me at all times in Asia, fluoro, incandescent, neon, it doesn't matter over here unless it's lit up... so when I'm in America, I'll avoid driving for a few days even, because basically it's all black to me after dark, until my eyes have adjusted. The darkness can last quite awhile IME, months even.

1. You live in St. Louis. That's your first mistake.
2. Who the hell wants to have flood lights canvassing their cities? I prefer a little darkness.
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post #49 of 53
8/30/10 at 2:36am
Quote:
Originally Posted by IUtoSLU View Post
Learning and experiencing provoke extremely different reactions. I lived in a Bangkok slum - one of the poorest in all of Bangkok. It was eye-opening. I'm a better person for having experienced it and, at this point in my life, I can look back and see how naive and unexperienced I was. But at the time, it was very real.

Quote:
Originally Posted by SField View Post
For a month in Bangkok, one of the most modern and extremely tourist friendly cities in all of Asia to "shatter the reality" of someone is absolutely mind boggling to me.

Bangkok the most modern cities in all of Asia?? Sure if you just head straight to your hotel in Khaosan or Sukhumvit from the airport, and just poke around the glitzy shopping malls all day, then it could seem that way... but IUtoSLU's experience sounds entirely legitimate to me. Bangkok sucks up the poorest peoples in all of Southeast Asia, including refugees from some of the poorest countries in the world... there is nothing modern or bourgeois about a Bangkok slum. There's actually more poverty, malnutrition, and crime there than in Phnom Penh or Vientiene.

It all depends on how an individual has traveled and how perceptive they are... you can lead a sheltered life anywhere in the world and not experience anything... or you could experience everything, live in a refugee's home and eat their food or whatever, and if you're not particularly thoughtful you could be totally unchanged.

I agree that 'reverse culture shock' is a bit much, but I find it is healthy to leave the US once in a while to get some perspective and appreciate what I have there.
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post #50 of 53
8/30/10 at 3:30am
Quote:
Originally Posted by SField View Post
Not as easily since they don't live in nearly as insulated an environment as americans do. They are used to less personal space, walking everywhere, speaking and understanding multiple languages, and all other sorts of things that create "culture shock" for americans.

thats how you imagine europeans
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post #51 of 53
8/30/10 at 4:59am
Quote:
Originally Posted by SField View Post
Not as easily since they don't live in nearly as insulated an environment as americans do. They are used to less personal space, walking everywhere, speaking and understanding multiple languages, and all other sorts of things that create "culture shock" for americans.
Hmm this sure is stereotypical and false.
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post #52 of 53
9/7/10 at 10:24pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by impolyt_one View Post
Actually, one very noticeable thing I get is this: I usually spend a year or two (sometimes more) in Korea and then travel around Asia once in awhile for fun, and then when it's time to visit home, I stop in Tokyo, then have to pit stop in LA, Minneapolis, Detroit, etc, but I stay in the airport and it's usually light outside, so when I hit ground in St. Louis, it's always inevitably night time, and the first thing I notice is how incredibly dark it is in America.. American street lights just don't light up anything, and there's no signage or anything else that really lights up much, and tons of dark space in between. I am used to a zillion jigawatts of light blaring on me at all times in Asia, fluoro, incandescent, neon, it doesn't matter over here unless it's lit up... so when I'm in America, I'll avoid driving for a few days even, because basically it's all black to me after dark, until my eyes have adjusted. The darkness can last quite awhile IME, months even.

That's a good thing IMO - less light pollution, and less wastage of electricity and lighting.

I wish American cities had even less light, not more. I remember laying outside and staring at the stars -- these days, even in the 'burbs, there's simply too much light.

So, I do something more challenging like staring at a wall instead.
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post #53 of 53
9/7/10 at 11:00pm
I visited the states for the first time in two years, this year. I had people staring at me and talk shit about me within the first day (this was in SLC airport and in my home town, so I guess its to be expected), I also feel that Americans are fatter now than when I left, I forgot what it was like to be around people shouting into their cell phones all the time. Really though I think the biggest form of culture shock was felt in my bowels. Couldnt shit straight for three months, American food has so much god damn salt and fat in it. After reading more of the thread: I actually liked how dark it would get back home, here you can see a couple planets maybe one star or two at night, back there I could drive 30min outside of the city and see thousands of stars, though in town its getting worse.
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