As some of you may be aware, I was born and raised outside of the United States of America. I grew up mostly in the Puerto Rican culture, speaking Spanish for most of my upbringing. While growing up, I was lucky enough to experience the technological revolution that took place in the 90’s, where many discoveries and inventions happened, which helped a lot with learning English and the North American culture.
With TV and cable, I was able to animations from US and Japan. Some which became a popular culture, like the Yu-gi-oh card game, were all the cards were in English. Also, my stepfather was in the military at the time, so I was also introduced to the military culture. By the time I joined the military, I was already fluent in English, and I already had a high expectation of what I was getting into. Surprisingly, this did not lead to a culture shock, but rather disappointment due to things not being as harsh as I imagined. I like to make this introduction, to explain the context of my culture shock experience.
My Culture Shock Experience
Being in the military has given me a chance to travel to many different countries, and see many cultures. When we travel in the military, we always travel to something I would call a ‘culture safe zone’. It’s an area (like the military base) where a completely different culture that we are familiar, or know very well, is in a completely different country that has its own culture. By being in this ‘culture safe zone’ we are able to avoid the feeling of being in a different country, and even feel safe and comfortable.
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While traveling, I felt safe and comfortable traveling from and to this ‘culture safe zones’ (military bases), only exposing myself for short periods of time to the other country’s cultures. It was very different when I decided to take a week vacation to Seoul, South Korea. I had the experience of being stationed there, but I never had the experience of being by myself (with my partner at that time) and no one else I could talk or share anything with. At this time, I felt alone, frightened and sometimes even disoriented. The only thing that I could refer back to, was a Starbucks that was close by.
Luckily, I was able to use some cultural universals, some hand gestures, facial expressions and sounds that helped me move around. In about a day or two, I was starting to feel more comfortable with the surroundings. It was very interesting to see how close people get when they are in line for a restaurant, or how some would even cut in front and no one would really react to it. Norms were definitely different to what I am used to. Bargaining was another norm that I wasn’t aware of, which my Korean friend helped me with in a famous market place in Myeong-dong.
