Culture Shock

By Hongli

The United States is a nation of immigrants. Although the reasons people come here are different, in common the reason is the same, they are seeking freedom and opportunity. But are you ready to survive? Have you already experienced this, or are you experiencing "Culture Shock"? I have.

Before I arrived in America I had no idea about culture shock. I had not prepared for anything, I just came. So when I really arrived here, I was really shocked by the different and strange culture. All or most of my familiar cues were removed. For example, when I am in Beijing, China, I never worry about the transportation. In the city, I can go everywhere by bike, by bus, and by taxi. If I want to travel to another city which is a little far away, I can go by coach, by train, or by air. It is really very convenient. For the daily shopping, it is much easier. Almost every neighborhood has its own convenient store, where you can buy anything you want for your daily life. If you want to go shopping in the shopping mall, you can just take the public bus, it is very cheap, only 0.4 Yuan, about 0.05 Dollar. Usually you just need to wait about 5 minutes each time, because there are a lot of public buses. But here in America, I notice it is very difficult to go out if you do not have a car. Even to buy the necessaries of life is also very hard.

For me, the hardest time was in the first several months when I did not get my own car. I had to walk about 30 minutes to the nearest grocery store to buy food and vegetables. When I went to At&t store which the nearest is 2 miles away, I had to take a bicycle and to share the lane with motor vehicles, I was really very afraid at that time. One time when I went to a shopping mall by bus, I waited about 40 minutes outside in the cold winter. Once I also called a taxi from my home to the airport, it was around 10 miles, but I spent more than 20 dollars for the taxi. It was really very expensive. Even after I bought a car, it was still not freedom for me to drive anywhere, because the speed limit of the highway was too high for me to drive. In addition, usually the grocery store is still a little far, so I prefer to shop once or twice a week, I still can not eat fresh vegetables and fruits everyday.

I also have interviewed some other people from different countries. A Korean says in her country people usually automatically divide the trash into daily trash, paper, plastic, metal and other recycling trashed and put them into different trash cans.
But here she seldom find different trash cans, and she does not know how to deal with her trash. An Israeli mentions the biggest culture shock for her is her children. When her family is in her country, the children can play outside by themselves and she is not worried about them. They are free and safe. But here she never lets her kids go outside because she thinks, and other people also tell her, that it is dangerous to do so. She is under great pressure now. She becomes very nervous and sensitive. A Chinese says although she likes the environment and the clean air here, but she can not adopt well to the food and boring lifestyle, she miss her family, friends, and Chinese food very much, and she decides to go back China after she graduates. Some other people also think there are some very ridiculous things they can not understand, such as in the TV show, some American can speak loudly about sex and lies and never feel shy. Or often there is a long line of cars waiting outside McDonald's but at the same time inside there are only a few people eating there, it is really very strange.

Anyway, culture shock maybe is different for every one. But if we want to survive and find chances for us and for our children in America, it should be better to conquer culture shock as soon as possible.