Depending on your level of travel experience will determine your definition of culture shock. Not to pick on the kid from Louisiana, but he or she might think culture shock is in only the first moments or even first day of entering a new culture. A gasp at the new way of life and then a quick moving on. However, if you have ever internationally crossed cultures, you know culture shock is hardly ever limited to one day.
Arriving in Egypt, I soon realized I underestimated the amount of culture shock I would experience. I’d faced the ugly side of culture shock in previous travels, so I had thought my experience would prepare me for the new culture I was about to be immersed in.
I was about 5% right. While I understood the emotions coursing through me, it was way beyond me to stop them. And then I realized that that’s okay. Its okay to experience every. single. emotion. In fact, it’s good.
Actually, this time around what prepared me to deal with my culture shock the most was a book I’d read before hand that I recommend to any traveler, Christian or not. Mack and Leeann’s Guide to Short Term Missions, showed me that no matter how many times one travels and how ugly the culture shock one has dealt with before, if you enter a new culture you will to some degree deal with culture shock emotions.
I was beyond exhausted from my 30+ hour flight travel to Egypt, but there is no rest for the weary. The smallest cultural things added like sand until I was buried 10 feet under. Even the odd cultural food they served on my last flight took me back and while I tried to act excited about the new experience, I just really wanted a pizza. Once we (my two friends Beth and Abby) passed through customs we meet our local Egyptian friend in the lobby.
I was dazed from the long travel, and forgot about the middle eastern culture of kissing on both checks as a warm greeting, but thankfully our friend saw Beth and Abby first so I had a 10 second gap to mentally prepare to have the same exchange with our friend. I still get internally panicked when an Egyptian goes in to kiss both of my checks. My America brain does not compute!
The same day we were taken to get local sim cards, shown the office, and finally landed in our new home. The flat was much larger than we imagined and had AC in two of the rooms, which we will be eternally grateful for. However, our friend told us it was too late to go out to get food so they were going to order in the flat. Then they insisted on eat Shawarma. Now if you don’t know what Shawarma is, basically it is a chicken wrap with a creamy sauce inside. If you know me, you are saying one big “oh no” right about now.
I’m going to write about my vegetarian experiences more in depth in a later post, but for now all you need to know is that I’ve been vegetarian about 10 years now, and this was the first time in 10 years I’ve eaten chicken.
To sum my first day in Egypt up: kisses, chicken, and lots of Arabic.
But what was hardest to me was how causal Abby and Beth seemed to be. They weren’t showing any signs of culture shock. Granted I didn’t know them very well at the time, and I probably wasn’t showing it either, but I was frightened that I was the only one feeling negative emotions along with the good emotions. After some time here I learned more about them and how they processed their culture shock differently, and how it was just as real and challenging for them.
The first week in Egypt I was mostly alone, which was actually a huge blessing in disguise. It gave me time to process Egypt. To process the obnoxiously loud sounds of the city, the dangers of walking to the office, and the strange sounds coming out of people’s mouths. The busy, over-crowed nature of Cairo was overwhelming to me, but a week helped ease that feeling. Time doesn’t heal culture shock, but it helps.
In order to overcome some of the negative emotions I was trying to repress, I constantly tried to look for the positive things. Walking to work I would walk just a bit slower so I could take in the buildings around me and allow myself to be in awe of the new scenery. In Egypt it is inappropriate for women to look men directly in the eye, so I wore sunglasses while walking around, so I could look where I wanted to without being culturally insensitive. Now I can look at the people, and observe what they are doing. I can see the men lounging around smoking hookah and the men zooming away on their motorcycles to deliver someone’s food.
Its actually rather odd now writing about all the negative emotions I had when I first arrived, because many of the things that overwhelmed me I am starting to enjoy. Now I love walking around the city, especially at night and just being in the midst of the people. I’m learning to love the collectivist society here and enjoy the feeling of safety in numbers. The longer I’m here the more local friends I make that make me feel like I could live here forever.
All of this to say culture shock often comes with negative and positive emotions that can overwhelm you. Don’t suppress them. Talk about them, journal them, pray about them. Give yourself time to process, it doesn’t mean you are weak or incapable. In that time though, actively seek positive things about a culture, I’ll bet you can find them, even in the most extreme cultures.
Camel Uber? 