Lucas and I exploring the Japanese gardens in Bochum, Germany
A few people may think that living or traveling abroad is a dream. That is true, most of the time, but sometimes you may get stressed and overwhelmed or bothered by things that are different from your own culture. This is called culture shock.
The best way to get around culture shock is to inform yourself about a place before you go. Going to the next city? Look up what weather you can expect, local traditions and customs, and places of interest, as well as typical prices of items.
Going to a new country? Inform yourself on their type of currency, their local customs, the language, the weather, typical sights, what to expect and much more. And when you’re there, push yourself to get out of your room and go do things. Go walk around the city, with no place to go. Try different restaurants, go on new adventures.
Finding out information about the culture of your destination not only helps you decide what you should pack, such as pants for cold and rainy weather or shorts, but also does wonders in protecting you against culture shock. Furthermore, getting out and seeing the new culture keeps you from being stuck in your home-country bubble.
I know about Germany‘s culture- I had been to Germany 4 times, and somewhat for extended periods, the longest being 6 months. I thought that I was immune to culture shock because of this, but I was wrong. I mean, I don’t think I was completely prepared for what it would be like to live here for a longer period of time.
I knew that in the beginning, most everyone would be cold at first, and I would have to work harder to make friends. Not like in the US, where people hold the door for you, say hi to strangers in the street, and don’t usually express their blunt opinions to unfamiliar people. Or maybe this is more of small-town culture, I don’t know.
I knew that there would be a lot of rules and regulations to work through. Germans are very particular about being official. Not that this is not the same in the U.S, but I feel like it is at an extreme here.
I also knew that Germans like being more sophisticated. They like wearing full colors and blending in, where as I feel I like bright colors, and therefore I stand out. Germans do not have their national flag hanging everywhere, not even in classrooms in the schools. They don’t wear things with „Germany“ written on them. They don’t usually dress in a way that makes them look uneducated or sloppy, such as by wearing house shoes and sweatpants to the store. A colleague and I were talking about the culture yesterday, and he mentioned something that I had not thought of before. He said that the Germans are “Proud of not being proud.” I think this really applies to this situation.
I knew all of this and more. Yet somehow, in the past few weeks, I have started feeling kind of tired of living here. I don’t know if maybe I am having bad experiences, or if I’m going crazy. Right now, I feel like I can‘t wait to be back in the U.S. I have been here for a year and a half, and right now my boyfriend is leaving to go back to the US for a wedding for a few weeks. I will join him at the end of this week, which I am honestly not ready to face. I have a lot of things to wrap up before I fly back, and it won’t be any easier without him here to help and support me.
Maybe differences are generational differences that will change in time. But I think right now, it is much more than that. These are examples of cultural differences, of things I knew about but did not know how it would affect me long-term, or that they even would. I think that the fact that I feel so overwhelmed right now is also a factor in how I feel about living here, but not the sole cause.
I miss the schooling system there. Being a teacher here, I see first hand what lacks in the schools here. The schools are divided by ability level, from Realschule to Gymnasium. There are 3 groupings of schools or tracks you can go to after 4th grade. If your grades are good enough, you can go to a Gymnasium. This prepares you for college.
If your grades are decent, you get to go to a Gesamtschule. This can take you to the college level, if you push yourself hard enough. You have to take extra exams to get in, though.
Then, there is the Hauptschule or Realschule. This is the path for tradespeople and skilled workers. They are not prepared for college, but rather for a trade school, and although they can move up to the college level, it is very challenging. They would have to take a lot more tests and work really hard. Not very many people go to college after being at a Realschule or a Hauptschule.
The point is, Germany still separates people based on their perceived ability levels, where in the USA, we accept that all students have equal rights to an education, as far as I know. There is just a general high school. No need to separate the students by school to make them feel lesser than the others. Everyone is told that he or she has the potential of going to college. People in the US have more of a choice to be who they want, not who society believes they should be.
Also, I feel that the teaching quality lacks over here. The teachers are trained in how to structure a lesson, (which is something I would like to add to my bank of teaching education knowledge), but I find that the importance of the students lacks in so many areas. I find myself wishing that teachers corrected students‘ individual assignments, not just their exams. There is no way for a teacher to differentiate and help individual students with things they are not understanding, if the teacher does not correct their assignments.
I also feel that Germans generally have the idea that if they are not responsible, it is not their problem. For example, I was teaching the students, and I realized they did not have a skill that I expected them to have in English. I was told that this was a skill they should have mastered in a lower grade, and that I shouldn’t spend too much time on it.
I am kind of tired of every time I want to make a friend here, I have to push past their cold and hard outer surface and dig down to the gold of their hearts. Once I get there, I have them for life, but it is the getting there that is the harder part.
I don’t want to discourage you from traveling, or becoming an expat yourself. On the contrary, I want to share my experiences with you, so you are prepared, and do not experience severe culture-shock yourself. I encourage you to read more about culture shock and what you can do to better handle it.
I know that to handle my culture shock, I need to embrace the differences and remind myself that now I have the experiences from two different countries. I will apply the best of both in the future, so I will use my amazing lesson planning skills that I developed here, and my care for the students from the US when I teach. I know that things will not always be like this, that I need to get out and go explore more, and not let the little differences get me down.
“TRAVELLING IS A BRUTALITY. IT FORCES YOU TO TRUST STRANGERS AND TO LOSE SIGHT OF ALL THAT FAMILIAR COMFORT OF HOME AND FRIENDS. YOU ARE CONSTANTLY OFF BALANCE. NOTHING IS YOURS EXCEPT THE ESSENTIAL THINGS – AIR, SLEEP, DREAMS, THE SEA, THE SKY – ALL THINGS TENDING TOWARDS THE ETERNAL OR WHAT WE IMAGINE OF IT.” – CESARE PAVESE