Transcript of Podcast #18: Dealing with Culture Shock
In Attendance: Aimee Jiang (she/her) & Blanca Romero Mila (she/her)
Aimee: Hello, everyone welcome to another episode of the GIC podcast, my name is Aimee Jiang I’m the International Student Support Officer for Graduate Division. And I’m excited today to be joined by Blanca and we’re going to talk about culture shock. And I think we were talking earlier before we started recording. I think this is a phrase that you hear a lot from other students. They’ll talk about certain things that kind of sent them into a culture shock, or that we’re surprising for them. so we use this phrase a lot to describe things. But it is kind of bigger than just a like temporary thing. So we’ll talk about that a little bit today, and there’s some stages of that. But I’m gonna have Blanca introduce herself before we jump into it.
Blanca: Hello! I’m Blanca. I’m a first year Ph.D. student in the Biomedical Engineering Department. I’m from Spain, and this is my first year, being a GIC Mentor. And I’m really happy to be part of this podcast today.
Aimee: Yeah. And so I kind of briefly touched on it. But culture shock is, it’s a phrase of kind of stages, that define stages that we go through. Which can be a short term or a long term stepping outside of your culture. So can you describe a little bit more, though what culture shock is?
Blanca: Yeah, of course. So before this, I didn’t exactly know what culture shock was. So it was really interesting to learn like an actual definition for this term that we always use but we don’t necessarily know what it means. So culture shock is a normal process, it is really important to emphasize this normal, that a person goes through when it’s adapting to a new situation or a new environment in a new place. During this process we, we become aware of differences between our culture and the new culture we’re being exposed to. And this situation can make us feel uncomfortable, anxious, homesick, and even sad or angry.
Aimee: Yeah, and I think especially early on when you add in like jet lag and being tired and then you’re searching for a food that makes you feel comfortable. I know when I even travel, you know, outside of a place that feels culturally comfortable for me. Maybe there’s another language maybe I’m just there for a couple of days. It can feel really overstimulating, overwhelming, to be surrounded by people speaking a language, maybe, that I’m not as comfortable with, or all of the food around me to be different. So there are a couple of stages that we go through, and it’s not a linear process. We’ll talk a little bit more about that later, because it does generally look different for most people. But the, the psychology that this is based upon it defines culture shock, as you said as a normal process, and again, we emphasize, this is something that everyone experiences. As a student, you may experience it for a longer period of time, because it’s a longer program than maybe a short term travel. But a lot of people will feel it when they’re traveling as well. But the the psychological kind of definition ,defines it into 4 different stages. So the first stage is called the honeymoon stage. And so this is, you think about like how we define a honeymoon, it’s like when a a married couple goes off and has a good adventure together and celebrates their new life right? So it’s a very exciting process in a new beginning. A lot of people are excited about this new adventure. Sometimes things feel like you’re in a movie. There’s a lot of joy. around this stage for most people and often a lot of adrenaline as well. And so I’ve seen a lot of students who I meet mostly during like orientation, or maybe, as they’re moving into the campus, dropping off their transcripts. Where you can visibly see that they’re like pumped up, and an excited to be in America, to be at UCI, to be starting their grad school journey and there’s just yeah, there’s a lot of joy and and excitement around that stage. Do you remember what that was like for you when you first got here?
Blanca: Yeah. what you’re describing, that was me. I was so excited. I had it was, it was really hard for me to get here right. Getting here is not always easy and getting like the, the like the fellowships to get here, getting accepted into graduate school, so that all of that is like a really big excitement, moving out of home. So I was really, really excited. Everything was perfect. I, I didn’t realize that I was tired, that I was like exhausted that I didn’t understand most of the things that were telling me. It was just like excitement. Yeah,
Aimee: Yeah, it’s this new journey. I think, when they kind of describe it as feeling like a movie. It’s often because everything around you feels shiny and fun and the food that you’re trying is cool and unique and different, maybe, from what you had before. and those, the things that sometimes students eat, or the things that students sometimes do, like adventuring when they get here. I find that that’s often the first thing that becomes irritating to them later. So students will come and they’ll have, like In-N-Out, very common food for a lot of students to eat, it’s near campus, it’s very American, very Californian in particular, And then I find that as students maybe get to the second stage, which is a stage of frustration. They’re like the foods heavy, and it’s greasy, and everything’s burgers and fries. And I really just want something traditional for me. And so the frustration stage being that second stage is generally once you’ve been here for a little bit of time. That newness of everything, that adventure and adrenaline and excitement starts to wear off and you can kind of feel disoriented like everything around you is really confusing. You’re really tired all of a sudden. I don’t know if any of you have experienced like a really thrilling adventure. I’m, I’m not one of these people, but I know for people that talk about like going skydiving when they’re in the moment they’re like so excited. And then when they get to the bottom, and it’s over. All they want to do is take a nap, because all of that adrenaline and excitement is really exhausting for your brain and your body. And so the frustration stage is generally where a honeymoon is starting to wear off, and you’re physically and mentally exhausted. You’re very tired, and you’re starting to maybe see the differences between your culture and the culture you’re in or the values that you have and the people around you, traditions being very different. Those things are starting to stand out in conversations and the actions of people around you. And it’s no longer interesting and exciting. It’s irritating, and it’s hard for you to pick up on and understand. And this is particularly difficult for our students that maybe don’t find a good community here, or the language becomes more of a barrier. So if you’re not from a place where English is a commonly spoken language or you are, and the English is different. I know a lot of our students that learn more of a British English. Will get confused by very Californian American laid back slang kind of English. And so that can be particularly hard too. I noticed a lot of students talk to me about keeping up with conversations becoming really hard in this stage when you’re excited and the adrenaline’s going. When an American is talking really fast, it’s like, Oh, yeah, I can keep up, I know what I’m doing. But once you start to get tired and your brains overwhelmed and things are starting to sink in, it can be really hard to maybe understand what people are saying. Maybe you’re paying more attention to the you know, the different traditions and values and ways that we speak, and that can be really really frustrating. That’s why it’s called the frustration stage. Do you remember having any experience with that kind of feeling when you first got here, like early on in your time?
Blanca: Yeah. So now that, like what you said about the food that was like me, too, right, because in the beginning you just go to all these events. And all these events have, like, basically junk food. But you’re so excited to try everything. And at some point you realize your stomach is so upset it’s just he hurts and you feel sick. But another experience that I had in which I can relate this like, different like stages, was meeting new people or making friends. So in the beginning I would like meet with everyone, be part of all the plans I was invited to hang out with everyone. There’s like a really big like Spanish group here at UCI, so I would go with all of them. My brain would like consider all of them friends, and I would go to all the plans, no matter what the plan was. I guess that was like my meeting people honeymoon, and at some point, I was exhausted. I started not going to all the plans, and then I realized that I was just like just joining these people, not, not taking into account what type of people I feel comfortable going with. So I was like, all of them are my friends because they are the only people I know here. But the plans we are doing are not my type of plans the type of people they are, they are not my type of people, and so that produced like a really really big frustration in my brain. And it translated into me, thinking I was never going to meet people because I feel forced, I felt forced to be friends with these people, because they were the only people I knew. But I realized they were not just the type of people and the type, the style of people I usually go with. So yeah, just like, I think this was a big like frustration, frustration moment.
Aimee: Yeah, I, I do see that quite often where people get I don’t want to say overly involved. But they get super involved with lots of different groups. And then, yeah, they start to realize the things that I like to do, maybe I like to go hiking and none of these people like to go hiking, they like to sit down and at a bar and hang out. And you’re like that’s totally opposite what I like to do.
Blanca: Yeah
Aimee: But I feel this need to participate in a community because all of a sudden you’re realizing that you join things just for the sake of joining things because of the excitement of it. Instead of making friends where you actually have, like a a solid connection.
Blanca: Yeah, this group of people where, like a really big party group. So I would go to all the parties like 3 times a week. I’ve never done this in my life. I’m not a party person, I go to like parties when there’s like an important event going on like I only party if it’s a birthday, it’s like a end of the school year, or like these things. I’m not, I’m just not a party person, but I I would see myself going party like 3 times a week, and at some point I was just like, why am I doing? I don’t even enjoy it.
Aimee: Yeah, no, I do think that it’s one of the common things because, and I start to see a lot of students that maybe are like early morning people staying out late to get to know people, and it’s like that’s not you. So, but I think because right, you, you’re excited. You’re jet lagged. Life is weird and new, and fancy, you’re excited to meet all these new people, and you don’t take into consideration, what are my actual needs as a person when it comes to creating my community. And so that is a really big one. So you start out on that honeymoon. There’s all this excitement and adrenaline, and everything feels shiny and new, and then at some point, some, for some people, it’s a very quick change for some people, it’s the slow, some things start to become irritating, and then more things start to become irritating. And then generally, though people do move into the third stage, which is called adaptation. And so this is when you maybe even start to call your apartment your home, or you go back to where you’re from and that’s home but then, when you’re heading back to California to UCI, you’re also saying to people, I’m going home. So now you have 2 homes. So you’ve adapted a little bit more to your new environment, and it starts to feel a little more comfortable. Right? That disorientation of why am I here? What am I doing? What’s going on around me? Starts to go away, you maybe don’t understand completely some of the linguistic or certain cultural, like queues or you know, ways that people talk or movements or in the way that we say hello to each other, or things like that. But in general you’re starting to get a better idea of it. And maybe you’re becoming, it’s becoming easier for you to ask questions. I think in the honeymoon stage you don’t think to ask questions because you’re just too excited. And then in frustration stage, you usually don’t want to ask questions because you’re just so irritated with how Americans do things, and usually in adaptation, that is when I start to hear a lot of students talking to each other about like oh in my culture, this is how we greet each other when we’re friends. And now you have maybe a good community, and you’re introducing people to your culture, and they’re sharing, maybe their culture with you. So everything just starts to become a little easier for you to interpret and process through. Most of the time, when I see students in my office. they’re in honeymoon, and they just want to meet me because they’re excited to be here, or they’re in frustration, and they’re having a really hard time with their transition here. When I see students in adaptation this third stage that we’re talking about, it’s generally because they maybe joined GIC as a mentor, and they’re excited to be like, hey, I’m in a better space now, and I want to help other students through what I’ve been through. Maybe like you said maybe you didn’t have the language to what culture shock was but maybe you wanted to help students through that exciting and frustrating part, and to help them get to the adaptation. the way that you have. So I think that’s generally when I start to see students in this stage, and they don’t need my help as much anymore. It’s more just continuing to build community. I see them at events or in like mentoring programs. What do you think about the adaptation stage. Do you feel like that’s where you are, or you’ve moved into the next stage that we’ll get to? Do you remember when it changed from frustration to more of adaptation?
Blanca: Yeah. So I think I’m like, I’m in adaptation for sure. But like I’m kind of like far along adaptation like. So it just to follow with like the friends, update. I feel like what the change was really clear when I just like stop, like stopped and I listen to myself. And I was like, Okay, what do I want from this? Right? What, what do I enjoy? And then from here I, I started like I accepted that not doing what others do, it’s not going to make me be alone. I think that was my fear. I was like, if I have to be here for 5 years by myself, this is going to be hell. And I think that’s what, that’s what was making me do what I didn’t want to do, just to make sure I had people. But at some point I realized I, that I clicked and I realized that the important thing was to find the people that work for me, not just like people. So yeah, I started to do what I like to do. I, as you said, I’m on morning person. So I started working, waking up early and and doing my things and stopped joining those plans that I did not enjoy. So I didn’t completely like, remove, like those people from my life. I just joined what I really like generally wanted it to do. And then something else that I did is like I opened up to like other people. So in the beginning I would only hang out from people, from my culture, or like not only like Spain, maybe also, like Europe, kind of culture. But I didn’t have those, that many friends from like other cultures. So I start go. I started like going to class and opening to like Americans and people from like all around the world. And it was then when I realized that there’s actually people that are like me, like my style of people, that are like from other cultures. And at that point is when, like it’s at the point on right now, right like meeting your people and making sure I do what I want, and I don’t like feel pressured for like any like fear or anything. And just like, yeah. So it was like my 2 like advices, advices would be like to one, be like truthful to yourself, and two like open up to like other not only people, but all other like experiences and your context.
Aimee: Yeah, I think that’s really important because I think. like you said, it’s important to recognize what your needs are right, and it’s hard to do that when you’re too excited, and when all of a sudden you’re like all that excitement is gone and now I just feel really sad. And the fear of loneliness is very common for students, especially those that are in a Ph.D. program who are going to be here for a long time. And so really, when you get into adaptation, and you start to recognize that like, I’m not the only person like this in the world, right? The world is at UCI, we have a lot of students from all over the world and what other time in your life will you have that opportunity. So, getting to know other people, and realizing that I might be from Spain, we might have a student from Nigeria, who we like the same kind of books, and we like to get up early and go on a run. And I just made a friend who’s from a different cultural context than me. But I’m realizing how much we have in common. Or an American that likes the same things, or someone from Singapore who likes the same things, like anywhere in the world that we go. There’s always going to be someone who has a similar idea of you, maybe even similar values that you didn’t expect, because your cultures maybe are so outwardly different. But you have similar values, maybe within it. I hear from a lot of students that they worry that Americans are all going to be very like independent. And for some of our students that come from more of a collectivist society (defined as a culture that values the group over the individual) that feels really off putting but you’ll find a lot of Americans have very similar ideas about taking care of family or being really close to their families. So I think when you get into adaptation you, you all of a sudden have an open mind right like the honeymoon stage, your mind is all jumbled because you’re just too excited. The frustration stage, most people end up being kind of more close minded, I just want to be a people who are from the same culture, maybe speak the same language as me. And then there’s a point where you open up and you are more accepting of everything around you, and that would be adaptation. And there is a final stage, and I will be honest. I have seen students stay in honeymoon the whole time, because maybe they’re in a shorter program, and that, that joy just never wears off. I’ve seen students stay in frustration the whole time. Luckily for the most part, those have been also shorter term programs, so they’re like, I just don’t like it here, I’m not staying for OPT, I don’t want to work here, I’m going to go home. So if you’re stuck in that we have tips for you later. But do recognize that there are some people that just can never, just never get out of that stage. And then adaptation, I think, is a pretty common one for students to stay in because it’s still a, you’re still growing towards the last stage, but you’ve moved past frustration. And so that last stage is called acceptance. So generally the stage takes quite a bit of time. I will see a lot of my students getting into this stage closer to graduation. Sometimes it takes years to get to it. But you started to like you mentioned in adaptation, you’ve started to make new friends, and you’re learning more small details about American culture and that leads to not just an acceptance, which is what the stage name is, but also more of an appreciation. And I don’t, but I don’t want to see, I don’t want to see students say, I really like American culture better than my own. That’s not the acceptance stage. It’s recognizing the differences and appreciating what your culture gave you, and what American culture gave you, and finding a good in between for what that feels like for you. So that’s acceptance. It’s, I’ve chosen to be here, I love certain aspects of my culture, I also love certain aspects, maybe, of American culture, and I’ve combined that to create this new kind of space in my life. Do you see? I see you working towards this just having gotten to know you. Do you see any of that being something that you’re still trying to get to?
Blanca: Yeah, I think so. Yes, because and that’s something I want to talk about later. But something I would do a lot in the beginning would be to compare right like, Oh, in Spain this is better or Oh, this is better here, and that’s like very toxic to do, because you’re comparing things that cannot be compared. Like somethings gonna be maybe not better, but more convenient for you, which doesn’t mean it’s gonna be the same for the person next to you. Right? So the, the fact of accepting that both things are perfectly fine but some of them we will work, will work better with your lifestyle, with your way of doing. That helped me a lot to like stop like under rating one or the other. Because I was not like under rating American culture all the time, and I was not under rating Spanish culture all the time, but in certain aspects I would under rate one of them. And I’ve like, that made it harder to adapt. Right? So now I, I I’m starting to know how things work here, and I try to adapt to them. And if there’s something, for example, food I will, I don’t think I’ll ever adapt to American like food culture. I like my like European food culture. So I’ll just, I, I’m just implementing it with the tools I know, and the tools I can get here to my life here. But, for example, like schedule, I love the American schedule right? I, I don’t like eating like dinner at 11 pm. I’m just, I cannot do that, right? So I’m like transitioning into like American schedule, which is like, awesome. So yeah, just like I feel like combining both of them, but not under rating any of them. Yeah i’m in that process.
Aimee: Yeah. And I think it’s, it’s, it takes time, right? It’s, it’s definitely a process. And I think you mentioned something that’s really important. It is really toxic to compare negatively, I think there is in this acceptance stage, what they’re getting that is that you’re comparing an appreciation you’re like, I appreciate the way public transportation in Spain works. But I also appreciate the independence that a car can give you in the U.S., right? You’re not saying public transportation is way better, transportation here terrible. I hate driving cars. I hate all this. You, that hate language, that negative language. It’s I can see the benefit of one, and I can see the benefit of the other. That doesn’t mean you don’t have a preference. I’ll be honest, I appreciate and prefer public transportation in Europe, and probably, I’ve heard Asia is even better so I’d probably appreciate it there as well. But I also understand that the culture and the U.S. especially where we live, is based around more independent driving and getting to places. And in some ways I appreciate being able to take a road trip where I can get out of the car whenever I feel like it. As long as I feel like it, and have less rules about it, not having to get back on the train, not having to do all those things. So I can appreciate both of those things, see benefits, but see negatives in both of them. So that’s really where that appreciation for it comes. And like you said with food. There are certain parts of American culture, where the food is just like fast food, and it’s greasy and it’s heavy. But there are, I would say, in this area, especially coastally in California, and on the West Coast there are some places that have more of a Mediterranean influence, with a lot of fish and lighter things and local vegetables. Our farmers markets really push that kind of mentality of eating more local and seasonal things which is very uncommon for some other places in the U.S. But you never have to adapt to it. Right? You can say I can understand the ease of this for American culture, but for me, I really appreciate being able to take time and eat my own food the way that I like to cook it, the way that I like it fresh. But maybe I do like to eat it 7 h earlier than I would have back home, because I’m a morning person and who wants to be eating and then going right to bed right, especially as we get older. Bodies don’t seem to like that as much. So I appreciate that because I do think you’re, you’re changing your mindset from a negative to a positive, and that helps you move from adaptation into acceptance. But that does come with time, and we briefly touched on this. But it, culture shock doesn’t look the same for everyone. Right? it’s not always a linear phase. Some people skip phases completely like I mentioned earlier some people never move past early stages. But can you talk a little bit more about how culture shock can look different for people.
Blanca: Yeah. So yeah, it’s mainly like what you mentioned. So there’s people that yes, go through the 4 phases. There’s people, as you said, to stay in honeymoon, which I mean it’s great, is it realistic? Not really, but, but great for them. There’s people that, unfortunately, and I’ve met a lot of people that just stay in frustration for so so so long. They just they keep focusing in this one negative thing. And they’re not able to go, go past that. In those cases I think like something, because when I was in frustration, something that helped me was and sometimes people just don’t consider it an option is therapy, right? Someone that opens up your mind and shows you these 100 good things and these 2 negative things are just like taking like that, your whole brain. So yeah. And then I don’t know. I, I am an adaptation. I and I feel like I don’t know when I’m going to get into acceptance. But I think it’s a really fine line between adaptation and acceptance, right? Because I mean, once you adapt, it’s like, if you’re going to transition really slowly from one to the other. And something really important to know is that you can be in adaptation or acceptance for years and all of a sudden frustration comes back and that’s also totally fine. I don’t know. A lot of things can happen in your life. All of a sudden your Ph.D. can get harder, or something can happen in your like home like, back in your country that makes you like your brain like pre, like reprocesses, everything. And that’s also fine like you achieving this acceptance does not mean you cannot just like have another like the, the the cycle all over again.
Aimee: Yeah, I think that’s really important. Because, like we mentioned, it’s not linear, right? You don’t go from one to the other. Sometimes you skip, but sometimes you do go backwards. And you mentioned this, and I think this is the most common time that I’ve seen. Is when something happens back home. Whether that’s on a personal level. When Covid started early on, I saw with a lot of my Chinese students that were really not happy with the way that campuses or American culture was reacting to the pandemic, the lack of care, maybe the lack of, that, I think that was when people started to recognize more some of my students that individualistic, I know what this word is, individualistic and collectivist society. Like the collectivist, taking care of each other right like. If one area of your culture or your country is struggling, everyone feels the pain of that right. But in the U.S. something can happen in the East Coast and the West Coast doesn’t even know about it, or maybe it doesn’t really care. And so I saw it a lot during the pandemic. Turkiye and Syriam when we had the earthquakes, I saw a lot with my students from those countries you know, just struggling with what’s happening back home, and maybe the lack of care that they were getting from faculty members or advisors or classmates. I saw it lot with Iranian students who were like no one’s paying attention to what’s happening and then it was like, months later, some of their like peers would be like, Hey, you’re from Iran, right? Something’s happening where you’re from. Are you doing okay? And they’re like, and I’ve been struggling for a months, where have you been? And so I think I saw a lot of those students where I knew they had hit adaptation, or maybe acceptance. And it was like they took a huge step back, because those things were mentally hard on them, and they were having to reprocess what it was like to be here as a student outside of their own kind of culture and comfort zone. And so like you mentioned, I think counseling is a really great option for that I know culturally, some people aren’t as open to the concepts of counseling. The GPSRC has often spaces for students just to come together too, to be in community, and I think taking advantage of those spaces is really important. And hopefully GIC will have some events this year that kind of talk more about this, or just like check in like, where are you? Are you still really excited? Are you hating being here? And that’s okay. If you come to my office and you tell me you hate being here. I’m not going to be like. Let me tell you how perfect it is to be in the U.S. I’m going to understand that it’s hard. I think my most recent trip outside the U.S.. was to London and Paris and those places, Paris especially is known for good food, but my body hated the food, and I felt miserable the whole time, and but at first I was really excited. I was on an adventure. I was on break from work, and this is a short term thing. But that doesn’t mean that I didn’t experience partial culture shock, and just like being overwhelmed with the language and the food and the way my body was reacting to it. And so you’re not alone. Make sure you talk to people about it, and who better than other international students? So come to GIC events, check in with your mentor, if you have one, international coffee hour, I see a lot of graduate students going to that event. It’s another great place to connect with students who get it, right, who are in it, or have moved through it. And so I think, if counseling is something you’re not as open to, even though I would highly encourage people to do it, especially early on, just so you have that person helping you through these stages, use those events as a place to feel less alone. And so, because you’ve been through some of these stages, and you’ve talked a little bit about some of these things already. What kind of tricks would you encourage people to do to try and overcome some of the maybe more negative parts of culture shock?
Blanca: Yeah. So some of the things that I did, some of them I’ve already talked about, so I’ll just go to them quickly. But the first one is, as I said, be really open minded. Try to learn about everything that is around you. Even if you like, disagree with something someone says or with something someone, does try to learn about it. Just like as long as you understand why that person does that. Why, this society thinks this, just like understanding. It’s gonna like, open you a lot of doors. Also try to like, not negatively compare the new place to your home. They’re just different places. Try to ask and acknowledge both, and just choose the aspects of each culture that like just work the best for you. One thing that also help me is to like just like really easy like, write a journal right. Try to, I don’t know, maybe not every day, if you don’t have time, but every once in a while just get a journal, a notebook and try to write, something that helps me is to write like a couple like positive aspects of your day. Even like, especially when you have a really bad day, just getting a piece of paper and writing 2 good things that happen to you that day. Even if it’s just like one, really helps you like refocus from the negative to the positive, because sometimes we just like get so overwhelmed with all the negative, we just forgot, we forget that there was actually like that one positive in our day. And with time it will transition to like actually like more positive than negatives. What else? Really important, do not seal yourself up like. Open your, open up yourself, meet new people, classmates, even like I don’t know, like GIC peers if want to be part of GIC, meet people in like clubs, or I don’t know, in like different places, and at the gym and just open up, meet people, and then, and you will find the people that like suits your lifestyle better and, and your personality better. Also, something really important, ask questions. Anything you don’t understand, even if it’s like an English word or a situation, an abbreviation, an acronym. Like my friends, like my American friends, use so many acronyms when texting. I don’t understand anything. I’m like can you stop doing that, please? In the beginning I would just not understand, and I wouldn’t say anything, and I would miss a lot of information, and I would feel left out and no one was doing that to me, I was doing that to myself. So just ask, they will be more than happy to answer. They’re not gonna think you’re dumb. They’re not think you, they just they’re gonna answer. And even sometimes they ask me, Oh, and how do you say it in Spanish? So like it goes both ways. Just ask questions if you don’t understand what a phrase is. If you don’t understand what a food is, a place is, just ask. If you’re like in a meeting with your lab, with your PI, and you don’t know what they’re talking about, you don’t understand those English words, or you don’t know how to express something. Just try to explain it the best you can, and they will give you like the words like the English words, and they will try to like help you. That really really helps. Because I went from like not understanding everything and not being able to express everything, to just like not caring, asking, and being able to like, fully communicate. And the last one is to be open about your culture. So something that I do now is that when I see something that it’s not familiar to me, something that people does or says that we don’t do in in my country, I, I always say, Oh, I’ve never seen this. We do it this way, or I’ve never like eaten this the closest I have there is this. And people like that, too, if you’re learning about them. But you don’t realize they also want to like, learn about you. Yeah, I think these are my advices.
Aimee: Yeah, I think that last one is really important. I think more Americans are open to learning about other cultures. And for some Americans, maybe they have ties to your culture, and they don’t know much about like the culture of their ancestors. And they’re really excited and they really want to learn something about their family history or the place that you’re from, because that will connect them to their ancestors as well. So I think, being really open about your culture, participating in events maybe, the International Center does where you can share more about your culture. Or if GIC has a space for you to come share about your culture. I think I would encourage people to always participate in that. And I think you mentioned something, too. We have a lot of acronyms on campus in general. But Americans do tend to like I don’t, because I think it’s really unclear, we tend to shorthand a lot of things into acronyms.
Blanca: A lot!
Aimee: So many things!
Blanca: Like a whole sentence all of a sudden it’s like 6 letters. How am I supposed to know what those 6 letters to mean,
Aimee: And I feel like the younger generation does it even more like I get lost sometimes when I’m talking to people younger than me or my husband’s friends we’ll have like a group chat, and they’ll put something in there. And I’m like, what does this mean? And I Google it sometimes because I’m like, I should know this. I just feel old, but I think we all have those like questions, and sometimes the acronym that one culture uses might be different. So if you have a shorthand in your culture, and you’re like this doesn’t sound right. The context, it’s fitting in here. That can be different too. And Americans have a lot of weird sayings, we tie a lot of things to baseball and baseball is not always universal. So if you don’t know a lot about baseball, and people are like 3 strikes then you’re out. You probably would be like, well, I don’t even know what that means. And that’s because you try to hit a baseball 3 times, and if you get, if you don’t hit it within those 3 times you’re out and it you don’t get to continue to play the game so. The, often that’s used in classrooms. I see, that one is pretty common and we’ve talked about not comparing things to each other a couple of times, and my American brain keeps going, it’s like comparing apples and oranges. That is a really common phrase that we use when we’re trying to describe, comparing things that are very different, right? Like the way you peel an orange and the way you peel an apple are very different. If you choose to peel an apple because you can eat the skin, you can eat orange skins, but most people choose not to. They’re kind of bitter unless you make them into a marmalade. So you those wouldn’t be the same thing right? And so when we’re talking about not comparing your home, maybe that’s the orange to the U.S. which would be an apple. You can’t, because they’re so different. But you’ll hear a lot of phrases like that. And sometimes I hear phrases because the U.S. is so large and has a lot of different cultures. Sometimes my coworkers or friends, will say something. and I don’t even know what they’re talking about. So I ask questions all the time. and that’s just a big part of our culture, it’s just being open to being like, what did you mean by that? Or I’ve never heard that before. But I like what you said to turn that around and be like, Oh, I, we, we don’t say something, we don’t say that where I’m from, but maybe we have a similar saying, and here’s how we say it, and this is what it translates to. And maybe I like the way you say, but this is, yeah, this is how we do it. Just sharing something about yourself, not just not just taking in what you’re learning, but giving out something that would teach someone about your culture as well. So I think those are some great tips. Yeah, I think the llast thing I mentioned earlier is just get connected with people on campus, so that you’re not alone. And you mentioned it, loneliness is a really big fear of a lot of students, especially those that are going to be here so long term and don’t know someone when they’re already coming in. So if that’s you and you’re nervous, get involved, try different events, but don’t feel tied to just one person or one culture, or one connection. Be really open to sitting next to someone in class and just asking them what their name is, and seeing if you have anything in common. Maybe they share something in class, and you’re like, Oh, that’s a really interesting point. Tell them you thought it was interesting. Could be a beginning of a good friendship, or at least a study partner. You never know. Any last advice or thoughts on culture shock from you.
Blanca: I didn’t know. I think I think it would cover a lot today. But I don’t know. I would say. Just like, try to enjoy your time as much as possible. If you’re struggling, try find help. And it will get better, because it’s usually does.
Aimee: Yeah, I think sometimes we have those setbacks, you know, when we miss like a big cultural event, or we’re feeling really homesick. We miss our families. Holidays are coming up. It’s too expensive to go home. Whatever is happening. It can be really hard. But I I like the way that you brought up. It’s really important to remember the positive, too. You’re doing something different. Maybe you’re the first person in your family to leave your country and come to the U.S. and study here. Think about what this will mean for your professional development and for your skillset. What are the things that you like about your class. Maybe you’re having a hard time communicating with your advisor because of cultural differences or just differences in the way you do things. But maybe you’re really enjoying what you’re learning in your classroom or the people that you’ve met in a lab, maybe that you’re a part of. So remembering those positives. And you mentioned journaling, I think that’s a really great idea. I don’t always journal, but I like to save things that I get from students that are positives on the programs I run or the things that I’ve done to help them, because sometimes life gets really hard. Ph.D.s, Masters programs can get really hard. You get rejected a lot in grad school for internships, for jobs, for thesis papers, for journal articles, whatever it is, and sometimes that gets so draining that it’s nice to have something like a notebook to go back and remember all of the positive things. So I like to go back when I’ve had a hard day or a negative experience at work, or when I’m feeling burnt out and just go, Okay, that student thought I did a good job. My co-worker thought I did a good job on this. This made a really good impact for students. I’ll get data sometimes I’m like, okay, my programs effective. So I encourage that too. In this capacity to to write down the things you’re enjoying, and to go back and remember that you’ve enjoyed those things during your time when you’re having a hard time. But thank you Blanca for this conversation. I think it’s really helpful to look deeper into what culture shock really is defined, as instead of just this phrase that we throw around. So thank you for helping us kind of navigate through the different stages and what it can look like for people.
Blanca: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. It was really nice talking about it.
Aimee: Awesome. Well, thank you all for joining us. We look forward to seeing you on the next episode.