by By G. Lenny Munny (originally printed in The Expatriate, Fall of
1998)
So you’ve signed on for the emotional roller
coaster ride of your life, been admitted to the financially
floundering Southeast Asian theme park commonly known as
Korea. Watch out! Because developing a taste for Kim chi
and successfully ordering a round of maek-ju isn’t solid proof that
you’ve shirked culture shock unscathed and deftly adapted to the
Korean way of life.
I survived another day of mindlessly infantile
kinder-chatter at the hagwon and then, having finished H. S.
Thompson’s Hell’s Angels, embarked on my next paperback journey to
The Land Where Big Words Rule. Fittingly, the book was titled
ON BEING FOREIGN: Culture Shock in Short Fiction-An International
Anthology, by Lewis and Jungman (editors), and included a
comprehensive introduction to the six phases of culture shock.
Overlooked I’m sure by Oprah’s Book Club researchers, this nifty
resource and an invaluable Silly Putty Egg were inherited following
the departure of another teacher who, when initially coming to
Korea, traded his meth spoon for a soju glass. Thanks,
dude. The book hit home like a heat-seeking
sledgehammer.
The experience of being a foreigner, of
being an expatriate on an extended sojourn, is the bond we share
here in Korea. Although each situation is unique, a basic
pattern has been shown by social psychologists to underlie the
experience of being a stranger in a strange land. Research
indicates that most sojourns are marked by six dynamic phases, which
are accompanied by drastic and profound emotional and personal
changes.
The first, or Preliminary Phase, includes the
decision to leave home, preparations and going-away parties, and the
initial effects of the journey from home to host culture.
During this period, emotions run high as tremendous anticipation of
what is to come is tempered by regret at what is to be left
behind. You may be viewed as both a fearless cultural
adventurer and a celebrated western failure but, nevertheless, your
bravery is revered and courage envied by lackeys who seldom leave
their living rooms for anything beyond the all-inclusive interior of
a travel brochure.
Next, the Spectator Phase begins with the traveler’s
arrival in the host country. Emotions rise further and careen
erratically as the foreigner is struck by the monumentality of the
new surroundings. This crucial stage simply overwhelms the
ill-suited and weak-hearted travelers, many of whom subsequently
take flight. Hanging on for the roller-culture ride,
more-flexible foreigners become largely passive but intensely alert
spectators during this stage. It feels like being the only
nine-year-old in a pre-calculus class lectured in Laotian; you’re
damn proud to be there, and sure, the numbers are familiar, but what
the fuck are those strange symbols and that garbled language
everyone’s using? Like motion picture reels spliced
indefinitely and unnoticeably together, life in Korea seems to never
relinquish momentum. You’re only reprieve is restless sleep
among the non-stop neon, yipping taxis, and yowling drunks naughtily
thriving in the twilight of the metropolis just outside your
window. This phase ends as the intensity of the new
impressions subsides and the spectator becomes more of a
participant.
During the Increasing Participation Phase, the
foreigner finds himself taking a more active role in the new
setting. As difficulties inherent to the cross-cultural
situation are realized and accepted, the individual’s ability to
adjust and overcome is put to the test. For many foreigners,
this phase highlights a turning point in the experience of living
abroad. An extreme clash of cultures and values may occur
resulting in resistance to adaptation and a swift descent into the
nadir of culture shock, the next phase. Or, for the flexible
expatriate, a series of challenges and maladjustments are gradually
overcome giving way to a growing sense of satisfaction and
self-confidence. But as the ability to tolerate and cope
improves, the expatriate begins to gradually internalize the host
culture’s behaviors, values, and beliefs. This subconscious
acceptance of ideals different from those instilled by the homeland
results in a kind of crisis of identity. It is as though the
sojourner’s awareness of the ability to function well in a host
culture has triggered a stark realization of the completeness of
separation from the home culture. It is at this stage that
life can seem artificial and pointless; that life’s deepest values
are just a grand fabrication supported by the vast majority and
perpetuated under the guise of contemporary culture.
Thus the Shock Phase strikes those who achieve success
in initial adaptation as well as those who struggle to acclimate
within the host culture. Usually the expatriate, who has been
getting along quite well for some time in the new setting, will sink
unexpectedly into a lethargy or depression for no immediately
identifiable reason. Marked by both an indifference to and
frustration with native hosts as well as fellow foreigners, this
state of culture shock can persist and develop into crisis
proportions: violence or paranoia, unbridled bouts of blinding
drunkenness or a lack of any desire to drink or socialize
whatsoever. Every expatriate, each in their own time, must
face the abyss of meaninglessness that separates the two
internalized cultures. After the effects of peering into this
netherworld of the social mind have subsided, the next stage
begins.
The fifth, or Adaptation Phase, is the end point of
the experience of being totally foreign, the final step of voluntary
assimilation. For some foreigners, full adjustment occurs with
the learning of the host language, a feeling of belonging solidified
by friendship with locals, and a sense of “shared fate” or
identification with issues and events in the host country. Yet
other expatriates, having never fully recovered from the depths of
intercultural nothingness, spend the remainder of their sojourn only
tentatively involved in the host culture, surviving on its outskirts
and relying heavily on the solidarity and support of fellow
foreigners. Not all bad, this half-hearted stance may in
fact lessen the negative effects of returning home after completion
of the sojourn when reverse shock is often felt.
The
Re-entry Phase is the sixth and final stage of foreignness and
occurs when the expatriate returns home and experiences culture
shock in reverse. Because this is the least expected phase, it
can be all the more uncomfortably awkward and confusingly
traumatic. Following the initial period of intense excitement
at being home again, the returned traveler may feel surprise then
disappointment at not being able to communicate the sheer uniqueness
of the experience to others. Time has marched on back home,
and not only is the traveler a changed person and thus
misunderstood, but family and friends have changed too and are no
longer the same as remembered. Feelings of being disoriented
and unwanted may result in a period of rejection of the native
culture.
Anything and everything here in Korea can
jade an expatriate and skew their view of life on this
peninsula. From a swindling hagwon director, all the way to
Korean Pizza Hut’s preference of Tabasco instead of zesty tomato
sauce (paramount to a proper pie), there always exists the potential
to flip us foreigners over the edge. Around my third month in
Korea, I noticed the classified ad in the Expatriate for a “free
mental health assessment by a trained social worker” and
scoffed. By my fifth month, I had heard stories about or
personally met enough whacked-out foreigners to keep that social
worker booked up like a Vegas hotel during a Tyson fight. And
now, well into my seventh month in this metropolis top-heavy with
populous, I’ve unwittingly tapped into my own personal funk.
And it has slammed me to the mat without warning. Suddenly, my
students are unruly brats, my girlfriend can’t do anything right,
and at the sight of every fake smile squeezed across my director’s
smug face, I wonder if I really could get away with burning her
hagwon to the ground. I’m convinced there are snake-like
scales hidden under the fancy suits of most Korean recruiters.
The GI’s are sickening, brainless and shirtless, as they run amuck
in the Dallas Club and Hollywood Star Bar. Even other teachers
have never before bore a greater resemblance to a freak sample of
westerners injected into the East as some kind of sick
socio-cultural experiment. And to the gawkers on the street, I
just wanna scream, “What the hell are you staring at?!”
But hey, there are always free samples of cheap wine
and ox knuckles at Mega Market.
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