When you study abroad, many students experience a certain feeling of unease when they get to their destination. While the unease doesn’t usually occur when looking at photos of the destination – it really starts to sink in the moment you get off the plane. The feeling of unease is a combination of anxiousness, fear, homesickness and bouts of feeling disassociated from reality. Well, there is a name for this condition and it is called culture shock. Culture shock is common and it can happen when you are in a completely new and foreign landscape far away from home. However, there is a way to cure culture shock, so that you can enjoy your study abroad program. Here are five ways to ease the culture shock when studying abroad.
- Know that you are going to be thrust into a completely new environment and culture. When it comes down to it, you want to make sure that you keep reminding yourself that you will be in a completely foreign place that you know nothing about. Preparing yourself for this fact can really ease your culture shock. You may even want to watch videos of a certain location or country – just so that when you get off the plane, it at least sounds a little familiar.
- Learn about a certain culture before you go. When it comes down to it, you want to read everything you can about a certain culture before you are thrust into that culture. For instance, you want to read about the people and some of their customs and you may even want to pick up on a few basic words in their language. At the end of the day, the more you know about a certain culture or location, the less foreign it will become and the less uncomfortable you will be when you get there.
- Never get bored. When you visit a certain foreign country, you want to make sure that you keep your itinerary busy. For instance, even when you are not in classes, you want to have something to do. It is often during a lag in your schedule when you start feeling the sinking sensation of culture shock. So, make sure that you stay relatively busy.
- Make sure to unglue yourself from your computer once and a while. Every time you sign into your social media accounts or email, you are transporting yourself back home. Even if you have visited http://www.accounting.businessdegrees.uab.eduand are getting your accounting degree online, you want to do your homework, but then close up the computer immediately afterwards. If you can, try to get outside as soon as you finish your schoolwork.
Meet people. When it comes down to it, the more people you meet in your study abroad program, the less foreign the landscape will become. So, you want to spend time with your host family and maybe even a few of your classmates. The more comfortable and familiar you become with the people of a certain country – the more your culture shock will become a mere bump in the road to assimilation.
