Jun
26
Written by:
David Strickland
6/26/2007 1:28 PM
42 Days left. We were packing last night and as we packed my wife and I began to laugh about all the things that would be different in India. Things like turning on a water heater 15 minutes before you wanted to take a shower. Remembering to turn it off when your done. Boiling milk before you drink it. Boiling the water before you drink it. The list goes on. No matter what country your going to culture shock is a possibility and if your not ready for it, it can knock you off your feet. I wanted to take some time today and look at some of the things I did before or during our last trip.
Perhaps the most important part of Culture Shock is knowing that it exists and being prepared for it. Culture Shock to me stems from the your expectations and prejudice. You get into a situation in another culture and for some reason expect that things in that culture will be like they are in your own culture. Based on the presupposition of similarity you began to act and react similar to how you would in your own culture. Then as events progress you suddenly realize that things are nothing like you expected. What started out as something you thought similar has become something completely different. You however had and are basing your actions and reactions on your presupposition of similarity and suddenly you find your self unsure of what to say or how to react as you struggle to find some point of similarity some point of reference you can use to interact with the events going on around you and as you struggle to find a point of reference the events continue to progress. If it's bad enough it feels like your feet just got knocked out from under you.
So how can you avoid it? You can't. Avoiding it is nearly impossible especially if the culture is radically different. We tend to understand the world around us by comparing it to our past experiences. As events around us happen we begin to compare them and find similarities. It’s this process of identifying similarities that seems to be most at fault for the feelings of culture shock. We see an event and establish points of similarity that are inaccurate, then trusting in this comparative analysis begin to react accordingly.
During my second trip to India I wasn’t expecting culture shock to strike. I was tired; I had traveled for almost 2 days straight. I arrived in India at about midnight. After getting through customs it was 2:00 am when I found I had to board a bus and be taken across town to the domestic airport to continue my flight. The bus bumped and jerked and eventually came to a stop it what seemed to my American eyes to be a dingy, dirty, dangerous part of town. The airport looked closed I had several thousand dollars worth of equipment with me and I began to wonder how I was going to keep myself and my equipment safe for the hours I was going to have to sit outside waiting for the airport to open. As I stepped off the bus with the other passengers into the darkened bus platform. I suddenly realized we weren’t alone. The bus had been lit but the platform wasn’t. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness. Greedy hands reached out to grab my luggage I hung on tight and yelled at the man to let go. At which point another set of hands went for my laptop. I saw an empty area of the platform just ahead I realized I needed to get out of the press of people if I was going to keep anything. So dragging my luggage and anyone hanging onto it I muscled my way out of the crowd. Getting ready to beat the day lights out of whoever was trying to steel my stuff. Just before I got clear enough to start swinging they let go. In shock I turned around to see what happened and realized my thieves where actually porters trying to help the passengers with their luggage. It’s their job to help the passengers but their only pay is whatever tips they can make. There are more porters then passengers so the result is a fight at the bus. When I walked away without letting go it was the sign I didn’t want to tip them and would carry my own luggage so they went back to find someone that would tip.
Ok enough on what culture shock is how do you avoid it.
#1 Read: Since culture shock is the result of mentally achieving an inaccurate point of reference read everything you can from the culture your headed into it will help you to be better prepared to establish correct points of reference. There is a series of books called "Culture Shock" just search for it on Amazon along with the name of the country. I.E. "Culture Shock India". Lonely planet puts out a good guide as well that is more travel based.
#2 Be able to find your way home. "Home" is relative on vacation overseas it's likely it's your hotel. Get a GPS before you leave and once you finally reach your hotel mark the Latitude and Longitude. Then keep it on you at all times. Also get something from the hotel with the address of the hotel and carry it with you. Having something to hand to a cabby or rickshaw driver that has the address on it will make getting back home easier. Of course you can always resort to pointing provided your GPS is working. Knowing you can get back to the hotel goes a long way toward putting you at easy no matter how much things shift, thus placing you in shock, you can always get back to a point of reference you can understand.
#3 Bring everything you need with you. Going out for a day trip? Bring water, a snack and toilet paper. Everything you need take nothing for granted. When you packed hopefully you left some room for souvenirs. Well on the way into the country fill the extra space with some favorite snacks. Soda tastes different from one country to the next. Snacks aren't always what you'd expect. It's worth the couple extra pounds to take along a few comfort foods. When your in a new culture eating new food and experiencing new things chance are your stomach is going to end up with your system in shock. Take some Imodium AD and some comfort foods along to get you through it.
#4 Remember that your way likely ISN'T the best way. You'll see a lot of things that seem odd. In an honest attempt to help you may attempt to do it the way you would at home. The result will likely be disaster that will leave you in shock. Take the time to learn from the culture your in. I never realized how much of a bigot I was until I started spending time in another culture. There were so many assumptions and biases I had to overcome it was surprising. Just because it's faster, cheaper or more efficient doesn't make things better. Remember that the culture or action your advising on has likely existed unchanged for a long, long time. Be sure that you completely understand why they are doing it that way before you recommend a change. Just because it looks similar to a task you do at home doesn't mean it is the same task. Along the same lines be careful not to judge the culture based on how much "better" they do things at home there are likely factors at play you are completely unaware of.
#5 Focus on the positive. Ok I'm a pessimist at heart I can see the down side of a free lunch. It's easy to find the dirt and the smell and the poverty. It's easy to focus on the street children or the homeless. In the end it can leave you in shock from the weight of it all on your conscience. Make an intentional effort to find things that are good. The morality, the family values, the simple lifestyle, the lack of stress or just the simple advantage of not knowing the world is on the verge and thus being able to be happy because of it.
#6 Take an interest in the history of the culture. Both before you arrive and while your there. You should likely know more about the history of the people then the people themselves. This will give you a better perception to find handles to understand them. If culture shock is caused by a false assumption of similarity knowing the history will help to understand the evolution of the culture giving you better information to establish points of similarity.
#7 Know the Predominant religion of the area. Nothing will send you into a tail spin faster then violating a religious dogma. When your in a different culture your not the only one that can go into culture shock. Your actions can send those around you into Shock as well. Just as your looking at them attempting to establish points of reference they are attempting to do the same with you. If you grossly violate there religious traditions it's likely going to make any effective communication impossible. Not to mention that you may have to endure their reprisals which are likely to put you into shock as you attempt to cope.
#8 Be flexible. Your expectations of on-time and the expectations of the people are likely two different things. Buses leave late, Buses show up late, sometimes by hours. Meetings start late. Stores are closed. Electricity isn’t always available. Water isn’t always available. Go with the flow.
#9 Let them take advantage of you. Ok take this one with stride. Understand that the people will eventually try it. A Taxi’s will be twice as much. Merchants will raise the prices the moment you walk in. Don’t take it personal. They assume you have money and react accordingly. The toughest part of this is dealing with other people over it. It’s seems to be endless curiosity to the people your with what you paid for something. They know that the merchant is going to raise his prices. You know he’s going to raise them. You haggle over the price get the merchant as low as you can only to then be ridiculed by everyone that you paid to much, even if you didn’t. How to deal with this is up to you. I choose not to tell them exactly how much I paid and when they ask just say “to much” it short circuits the joke and I don’t have to hear for the 10100x time how I paid too much.
#10 This isn't so much a method for avoiding culture shock as they are methos for dealing with it. I call them the "Arrogant American" and the "Friendly Canadian". Not sure why but everyone in the world it seems thinks American’s are Arrogant and Canadians and friendly. I’ve been in situations where I couldn’t figure out what to do. It seemed like everyone around me knew but no one would tell me or if they did it is so short and cryptic I couldn’t understand it and I was just getting the run around and no one will take the time to explain. When you find yourself awash lost in a sea of confusion unable to find a point of reference. One option is to pull out the Arrogant American.
"Arrogant American". Act like the categorical “worst tourist” Indignant, Impatient and better then everyone around you, start complaining and making demands to see their supervisor or talk to someone in charge. It’s likely that you will be put in your place however in the process you’ll find out exactly what your “supposed” to do in very basic terms.
"Friendly Canadian". Act overly friendly and WAY to talkitive and no matter what SMILE. Find the sternest looking person that everyone else seems to avoid and begin pestering him in as friendly a manner as you can about what’s going on and how to get what you need done. Be sure to ask how he is doing before you get started comment about the whether or whatever giving lots of details and always being very friendly. No matter how mad he gets just act completely oblivious to it and continue to be his best friend. He’ll try to brush you off but just keep at it eventually he’ll either answer your questions or direct you to someone else if he tries to send you to someone else. Pester him a little more about who the person is and how it is they have the answers. The point here being to make sure he never wants to take to you again because you are way too friendly and too verbose. Then go to the new guy ask him how he’s doing be friendly then when he gets frustrated with all the pointless information, tell him about your new friend and all the things you asked and how he said to talk to him and why he said he could help and then ask him what to do. The point being to make the story as long as possible again making sure that he never wants to talk to you again. You’ll only have to go through this once. Because the moment someone sends you back to someone you’ve already talked to that person will take drastic action the moment they see you coming to avoid having to listen to the whole story all over again.
One additional note on these two methods the first upsets the people in charge but makes everyone else that’s just as confused as you are feel better because at least someone complained. The second gets you through at the expense of everyone else around you. Because as your tell your incredibly long story the line behind you is getting longer and longer and madder and madder.