"How Do I America?"

What to anticipate after coming home from a semester abroad

 

by Jenna Lennon

 

 

Mandi Hinrichs spent her final semester at Emerson College eating, sleeping, and studying in a fourteenth century castle in the Netherlands. Kasteel Well, or Castle Well, is the college’s premier external study abroad program located in Well, a small town in the southern province of Limburg on the German border. 

 

“I know it sounds cliché, and literally everyone who goes to the Castle says this, but it was the most magical three months of my life,” Hinrichs says.

 

The program is aptly dubbed The Castle by former and current students where participants spend 90 days immersed in European culture from their host country during the week and from various  other countries on the weekends. 

 

“I think I was just so excited to be there, and I always knew I wanted to study abroad, and who doesn’t want to say that they lived in a castle?” the recent graduate says. “So I think I was just so excited, that there was no culture shock. I was just ready to dive into everything and just immerse myself in it.”

 

Although Hindrichs didn’t experience it, the program does leave ample room for culture shock: students have to adapt to a new dining schedule, time differences, and language barriers not just once, but every time they enter a new country throughout the semester. And yet, most students agree that returning home was even harder than leaving home.

 

Reverse Culture Shock

 

According to the U.S. Department of State, reverse culture shock is “the psychological, emotional and cultural aspects of reentry.” It’s seldom talked about while preparing for a trip abroad, but for many, returning home after being away for an extended period of time produces the same effects one experiences when leaving. And sometimes, even more so. 

 

That feeling of readjustment lasted quite a while for Hinrichs.

 

“Initially, I came back, and I kept joking around with my friends like ‘How do I America?’” Hinrichs says. 

 

“I was used to a certain lifestyle that I had grown accompanied to living, like the way that people would interact with each other, certain foods, the time difference.”

 

Hinrichs says she noticed her sleeping schedule change when she returned home to reflect when meals were served at the Castle or when the grocery store opened. She noticed how much more openminded and progressive she felt once returning home, and she noticed how much she missed the typical Dutch food she had grown accustomed to eating. 

 

“I was like okay well cool. I went to my favorite taco truck, but now what?” Hinrichs says.  “Like I thought there were things that I was gonna miss about America so bad, and there were some things for sure, but by the last day at the castle, I was a sobbing mess because I wasn’t ready to go back. I didn’t miss anything in America enough for me to want to come back just yet,” she says.

 

Melissa Newton, senior administrative assistant for Emerson’s Education Abroad and Domestic Programs, says it’s the “conflict of expectations” of returning to your home culture where changes may have occurred that ultimately lead to reverse culture shock. 

 

“From that, you become frustrated and coping with that frustration is pretty much having to readapt to your native home culture,” she says. 

 

Newton both works with students to handle the affects of reverse culture shock, but also experienced it firsthand as a student when she studied abroad in Japan for a year in high school.

 

“When I returned, my sister had gotten pregnant and given birth, so I came home to a nephew, and my best friend had changed schools,” Newton says. “So, I came home and my normal support system and family structure had changed a lot.”

 

Who Experiences It?

 

Reverse culture shock can affect anyone, and there’s no real way of anticipating how much, if at all, returning home will affect you. 

 

Bailey Bouchard, a junior political communications major at Emerson College, studied abroad in London prior to her semester at Kasteel Well in Fall 2016, but returning home from the Castle was still hard for her to handle. She says she doesn’t remember coming home from London, so her previous experience didn’t prepare her for the reverse culture shock she felt when she returned home last Fall.

 

“I definitely missed a lot of the things in Europe that I loved, and coming home to the things that I was [supposed to be] comfortable with was a little jarring because I had sort of grown out of habits that I’d had at home to adjust to the European style and culture,” Bouchard says. “So to come back to the things that were supposed to be familiar for me was very different.”

 

Even being able to easily communicate with other people or driving to get fast food made Bouchard’s readjustment difficult.

 

Julia Linger, a junior communications major at Emerson College, studied abroad in high school in Spain and with Bouchard in Fall 2016. And this Summer, Linger returned to Spain for an internship. Each time, reverse culture shock affected Linger in different ways. 

 

“When I came back from the Netherlands, the culture shock was about physical things: buildings, the way things looked…” Linger says. “But after working in Spain by myself, not around Americans, I realized coming back how Americans, we smile more, we all wear baseball caps, we all have water bottle holders on our backpacks.”

 

John Hermsen, program coordinator for the Office of Student Affairs at Emerson College’s Kasteel Well, says students returning from a semester at the Castle often spend the first few months talking about what they experienced and where the went; however, they realize the people around them don’t understand their experiences, and it’s a difficult transition for them.

 

“[Reverse culture shock] really depends on the person and what their feelings are on going back,” Hermsen says in an email statement. “Some students have their bags packed two or three weeks before leaving, ready to go home. Some procrastinate as long as possible and just don't want to go back.”

 

Tips/Advice for Dealing with Reverse Culture Shock

 

Talk about it: 

Hermsen says that although it’s difficult to prevent reverse culture shock fully, there are ways to anticipate and cope with it. “Students should be talking about all the good things they are getting back too. What did they miss?”

 

There’s a “difficulty in being among people that don't understand what they have experienced. Students who study abroad, wherever, always comes back as a ‘different’ matured person! A lot of times a student doesn't even realize that, and I'm sure parents, friends other loved ones don't either,” Hermsen says.

 

Stay Involved 

Bouchard traveled abroad right before the presidential election, and keeping track of the news is something she says helped her to readjust to being back home. 

For Newton, staying in touch with her family regularly during a transitional period helped her to adapt to moving back home. 

 

“Be a sponge…”

“…and don’t assume that you’re going to know what’s going to happen,” Linger says. 

 

“Kind of let things happen. Let that reverse culture shock happen, and be more observant of what you like, what you don’t like, and focus on what you want to incorporate. That’s the cool thing about going abroad: you learn what you want to incorporate into your daily life.”

 

Embrace the change

“I’m glad I didn’t come back and immediately go back into complete American mode because I feel like I learned so much from people in different countries and different cultures, and the fact that I struggled with coming back was a good thing,” Hinrichs says.

 

“I feel like it means I was changed, and that’s the whole point of studying abroad. You’re not just learning and taking classes. It’s an entire experience.”