Settling In

Arriving in a new city and getting started on the adventure you’ve been planning for months can be exhilarating. There are usually a tonne of events and activities planned, as well as people to meet, new foods to try, and things to see. However, As the excitement wears off and you’re faced with the challenges of living and studying in a new culture, you may find the differences between home and your host country become more obvious.

The initial excitement can sometimes turn to frustration and anxiety. You might experience what is often referred to as ‘culture shock’. Culture shock doesn’t always happen quickly or have one single cause. It usually accumulates from a series of events and experiences that constantly challenge your basic values and beliefs about what is ‘right’ and ‘normal’. Read below to find out what the four stages of culture shock are:

1. Honeymoon stage
   The first stage is usually characterized by an extremely positive feeling, almost euphoric. Everything is new and exciting. You might be thinking “This is the best decision I’ve ever made! Everyone is so friendly and positive; I love everything about this city and I fit right in here.”
2. Frustration stage
   During this phase, a strong feeling of dissatisfaction kicks in, and the excitement quickly starts turning into discomfort. Impatience, anger, and sadness are all characteristics of this stage. Miscommunication and failure to understand gestures are a source of frustration, and even the simplest thing might be able to trigger you! For example, asking for a cappuccino and getting a frappucino, getting on the express train and missing your stop, or not being able to find a familiar flavour potato chip in the supermarket.
3. Adjustment stage
   You slowly begin to gain a sense of direction and surely begin to feel more familiar and comfortable with the people, culture, food, and surroundings of your new environment. You might have also established some friendships that makes your experience feel more like home! Everything starts getting in order and you are ready to move to the next phase.
4. Adaptation stage
   This is the final stage of the culture shock, where you have adapted to and accepted your host culture and its differences. You might not have gotten the hang of it completely, but you are open to and have adopted the customs, habits and cultural practices of your new home. This final stage contributes to your successful integration!

One common misconception people have is that you only experience culture shock once, and that once you’ve adjusted you won’t feel uncomfortable or out of place again. This isn’t true though! It’s quite common to go through the stages more than once. What’s important is to recognise the symptoms, and learn what works for you when it comes to managing them. We cover culture shock in a lot more detail in the UniSA Pre-Departure Modules.

To make the transition from the Honeymoon to Adaptation stage  (see Culture Shock section above) as quickly as possible, there are a few things you can do. Some people get to this phase quite quickly but for others it may take longer. We’ve put together some tips to help you more easily adjust to your new environment so that you can have the best Study Overseas experience possible.

• Be patient. Adjusting to a new place takes time.
• Meet people and make new friends! Finding like-minded people who are going through the same experience you are is invaluable;
  • Find activities you think you’ll enjoy and ask people if they’d like to go too.
  • Participate in any orientation activities that are planned.
  • Join a club or student association to meet a broader range of people
  • When someone asks you to join in on an activity (even if it’s not something you’d usually be into) say yes!
• At the same time, allow yourself to have some time alone, and don’t beat yourself up if you don’t make great connections immediately.
• Set up positive experiences, and try new things in your host city, for example:
  • Arrange a dinner to try a local food
  • Movie night with new friends
  • Check out a local market of any kind
  • Go on a walking tour of your new city
  • Visit a cultural tourist destination
• Immerse yourself - use/learn the local language. Read local news or watch local television or movies. Listen to music by a local band that you hadn’t heard of before.
• Keep in touch with family and friends and share your experience! Share any cultural mishaps or miscommunications, but make sure to also share the positive things you’ve experienced.
• Keep a journal or set up a blog so you can reflect on your experience. It’s a good way of getting your thoughts in order, too:
  • What are your first impressions? What activities have you tried? What new things have you learned? What is making you concerned? Write down one new positive thing you have discovered each day.
• If you’re enrolled with an overseas university, ask for help from their international or support staff – they will have advice for students that are looking for ways to overcome culture shock and homesickness.
• Get plenty of exercise – this might be as simple as daily walks, or if you’re staying for more than a few weeks, you might like to join a local gym or sporting club.
• Even difficult situations have a positive side, try to find it. How do others cope? Watch them or ask them if they have any advice.
• Is anything the same as home? Look for the similarities, they can be comforting.
• Try not to judge others when they do things differently. Experiencing differences is a key part of studying overseas, so keep an open mind.
• If you’re feeling overwhelmed, set small goals that you can achieve every day.
• Acknowledge and appreciate your achievements and milestones!
• Keep in contact with the people you meet at the start of your program. Get their contact details or add them on social media and try and arrange to catch up with them later on!
• Give yourself time before making any big decisions.
• Ask questions when you’re unsure what’s expected of you. Gradually, you’ll feel more confident, develop new friends, and interact more comfortably.
• Reach out for help if you need it. There are a lot of people who want you to succeed, and who want to support you however they can.

Intercultural adjustment is extremely important to help you overcome homesickness and to have the most positive experience possible while overseas. There are a number of things to keep in mind that will help you build your resilience and overcome any culture shock you experience:

• Open Mindedness: Keeping your opinions flexible and being receptive to new experiences is important. Don’t refuse to try something just because you aren’t used to it!
• Sense of Humour: In an unfamiliar culture there are plenty of things which can make you cry, get angry, be annoyed, embarrassed, or discouraged. A sense of humour guards against despair when things are going wrong.
• Ability to Cope with Failure: Tolerating failure is critical. People who go overseas are often high achievers who’ve been successful in their home environments, and may need to develop ways of coping with failure and overcoming intercultural issues.
• Communication: The ability and willingness to communicate your feelings and thoughts to others has been suggested as an important skill for successful intercultural communicators.
• Flexibility and Adaptability: Responding to or tolerating the ambiguity of new situations is important to intercultural success. Keep options open and judgmental behaviour to a minimum. Get comfortable with feeling uncomfortable.
• Curiosity: Curiosity is the demonstrated desire to know about other people, places, ideas, etc. This skill or personality trait is important for learning the many things you need to adapt to a new environment.
• Positive and Realistic Expectations: There are strong correlations between positive expectations for an intercultural experience and successful adjustment overseas and at home. Remember that not everything you see online or on social media will match the reality, and that’s ok!
• Tolerance for Differences and Ambiguities: A sympathetic understanding for beliefs or practices differing from your own is important.
• Positive Regard for Others: The ability to express warmth, empathy, respect, and positive regard for other people is a key component of effective intercultural relations, even if you can’t verbalise it.
• A Strong Sense of Self: A clear, secure feeling about yourself creates a person who relates to others with polite confidence. People with a strong sense of themselves stand up for what they believe in, but don’t cling to those beliefs regardless of new information, perspectives or understandings they encounter.

It’s natural to feel homesick whilst overseas, far from your friends and family, and your everyday familiar routines. Particularly if you’re on a longer overseas program (but even if you’re on a short program) sometimes the pull of home can become incredibly strong, and you just want something, or someone, familiar. Being homesick doesn’t necessarily indicate you’re having an awful time, or that you want to go home, but it’s important to try not to dwell too long on those feelings, or it might become the only thing you’re able to think about. While you might not be able to completely get rid of the feeling of homesickness, there are a few things you can do to lessen it and not let it become all-consuming. Remember that a lot of people find themselves experiencing homesickness and that, with a little help the feelings usually pass.

Keeping in contact with loved ones back home is fantastic, though it might not always help to alleviate feelings of homesickness. Sometimes it might feel that calling home just exacerbates the feeling. One of the best things you can do to battle homesickness is actually to make positive connections in your new city, as soon as you can. Having people around you that you enjoy spending time with can help make your new environment feel more like home.

It’s also important to keep an eye on how you’re feeling long-term. Homesickness can present with many of the same symptoms of a more serious mental health issue, such as depression or anxiety, and you may need different support beyond using homesickness strategies.

A few things to remember if you experience any homesickness:

• Keep busy. When you arrive, there will be heaps of things you can do to keep busy and explore your host city. Looking around your new neighbourhood, find activities or clubs to join, check out the tourist hotspots, go out for groceries and explore all the new stuff you’ll be able to buy! The more you put yourself out there, the more people you’ll meet and the more familiar your surroundings become.
• The grass is always greener! Your thoughts of home are likely to be an idyllic image rather than actual reality. You might feel like you’re missing out, and it’s natural for us to romanticise ideas of home while we’re away. Remember that your family and friends will still be going about their daily grind, the train lines will still be out of service for months at a time, and the computer barns on campus will still be full. Instead, focus on all the good things around you, and remember that soon enough you’ll be back home, wishing you could be back studying overseas again.
• Look forward to what’s ahead. You’ll have days studying where you have an essay due on the Monday, so your weekend is crammed with study, but the next weekend you might be heading to London, New York, or Tokyo. Make the most of your time overseas by organising activities or travel to look forward to, and try to enjoy living in a new and exciting city and country.
• Talk about your feelings. Don’t forget there will be people around you who are having similar feelings, as well as people who will have ideas on how to combat them. Being upset everyday won’t be helpful to yourself or others around you, but acknowledging it and sharing will help release the homesick feeling, and you’ll be able to connect with people who will support you and help you push through the feeling homesickness.