I read all of the blogs that I could get ahold of on what it
would be like to study abroad. I thought I was more than ready for the culture
shock and the ensuing reverse culture shock whenever I got back. I thought I
could handle being away from my family and friends and only seeing them through
a computer screen. And for the most part I was right, since I have successfully
gotten over most of my initial reverse culture shock and have resituated myself
into my life here before I left. But here are a couple of things I wish I knew
before I left:
11) Culture shock can hit you in very weird
ways
As far as I can tell, I didn’t get what most people would
consider culture shock. I didn’t go “Oh my god, I’m in a new country and
everything’s new and scary what do I do?” and panic and want to go home.
Instead it was smaller things that were just slightly different. Immersing
myself in the culture itself definitely helped, along with the first little
events that the International Committee at my university put on for us. Being
able to find people who were having similar experiences definitely helped me
get past that first wave of shocked confusion. Not a lot of things in the UK
are terribly different, but there are enough things that it can be a little
jarring. Seeing a Sainsbury’s where you would normally see a Walmart or a Tesco
where you might see a Shell station is a little confusing, especially since I
couldn’t see a great deal of difference between the two beyond size. Which
brings me to point number two.
22) That thing about everything in America
being huge compared to the rest of the world? Yeah…
Okay, so I honestly didn’t think this one would be true
whenever I left. I grew up in a fairly small town so I thought it wouldn’t be
that different. Hoo boy was I wrong. There are about two groceries stores
within a ten minute drive of my house from home. Both of them are reasonably
sized, by American standards. In the UK, there were two groceries stores: the
Wilko’s and Sainsbury’s that were about a ten minute walk from my flat. I’m
fairly certain if I picked up the Wilko’s and dropped it into the Walmart at
home, I could have fit around two of them. The Sainsbury’s was a little bigger
solely because it mostly housed food and freezer items, so maybe only one
Sainsbury’s could have fit in the Walmart, but there would probably still be
walking room. This made it simultaneously easier and harder to shop for things
because while you knew exactly what you needed to get and where, you couldn’t
get it all in one place. Also, speaking of shopping…
33) People will judge you if your banking
technology is not up to date with theirs
So, before I left, I was told that I would be able to get a
chip-and-pin card that would work in the UK. But unfortunately, even after I’ve
gotten back, we still haven’t gotten them and people here are really, really
confused by them. The card that I primarily used while abroad was my debit
card, which only has a pin. I’m sure you can see the distinction here. At one
point I went into an hmv, which is an entertainment store, and whenever I went
up to pay, they actually had to pull out a log book to write down what kind of
card I had and my information. If that didn’t make me feel behind on
technology, I don’t think anything else would have. Luckily most of the pin
machines in the UK could be used to swipe, but only after the cashier knows to
change the machine to that. Moral of the story: Get a chip-and-pin card because
people will judge you since most of the UK at least has been using them for a
few years now. But if there’s one thing that definitely made me stand out was
my accent. Which brings me to number four.
44) If you think you don’t have an accent,
you’re wrong.
I honestly didn’t, and still don’t to be totally honest,
know what my accent was going into the UK. A lot of people in the US thought
that I sounded vaguely European, which I hoped would work in my favor. While no
one outright criticized me for being American (though I did get quite a few
questions about our presidential candidates once they found out), I was spotted
fairly quickly once they heard me speak. At one point, there were some
petitioners on the sidewalk for Brexit, though I wouldn’t be able to tell you
if they were campaigning to stay or leave. Since we were so close to the
university and from what I knew most of the uni students wanted to stay, I
would assume they were campaigning the rest of the town to stay as well.
Regardless, one of them comes up to me and asks, “How are you planning on
voting in the referendum?” And me, being the flustered and confused American
that I am, started to explain,
“Well actually—“ Apparently these two words were enough for
the petitioner to realize that he was barking up the wrong tree and immediately
he said,
“Oh! You’re American, I’m sorry.” And went about his merry
way trying to convince people to stay in the EU. Speaking of the EU…
55) You might not know much about the politics.
Not a lot of people care.
I knew just enough about British politics in order to sound
at least somewhat competent and not just like a silly American who thought that
everything was ruled by the Queen (I mean, it isn’t really, but who doesn’t
love the Queen??). But Brexit threw me through a loop and I honestly didn’t
know enough about the implications of leaving or staying to have a solid
opinion on it. I knew that a lot of younger people wanted to stay because it
gave them more freedom to travel and to immigrate to other countries if they
desired to do so. I knew that older people believed that the EU was
overstepping its bounds by having the countries take in a certain number of
refugees. But that was about it. The good thing was, I think a few of the local
students understood this since they didn’t ask me a lot about my thoughts on
the situation except for whenever they wanted an outsider’s opinion. Which to
be fair… is totally fair. I did the same thing whenever it came to this year’s
election.
So why am I talking about all of these things? Well, I
figure that if you’ve done your due diligence and taken your courses and read
your books, there might still be a couple of things you don’t know about
studying abroad. And I hope this will help you know just a little bit more.