Culture Shock?

Travel Info
For those that have stayed in Japan for at least a month, how did you deal with your culture shock and your reverse culture shock? Tell all the fun stories!

Travel Tips

For me, there wasn't a moment when I went into shock or anything- I was able to deal with it, although plenty of unexpected things did come up.

But you requested a story, and boy have I got some of those! Enjoy:

I came home from work one day, and saw that I had a message on my answering machine from one of my adult English conversation students. She was saying how her cat had died, and she was very sad, and she wanted me to come to her place for the "kaibou." So I'm all, yeah, the funeral, great. But when I bust out my dictionary... it turns out that kaibou means dissection!

So I call her up, and I'm all, you know, I think my Japanese must not be so good- it sounded like you invited me over to your place to DISSECT YOUR DEAD CAT!!!! Ha ha ha! And she's all, yes, I hope you can come tonight- I've been storing the cat in my fridge over the weekend, and it's starting to get hard and bloated. (The offer sounds more tempting by the minute! Maybe I can stay for dinner!)

I made an excuse, and she said she would write a report in English on her findings from the dissection and give it to me so I could comment. Fortunately, she must have gotten busy, because I never received the report.

Now, I am not suggesting for a second that this is some sort of national characteristic! Crazy is crazy in any language! I am pleased to report that she was the only person to invite me over to dissect her dead cat during my one year stay.

Reverse culture shock wasn't so bad- I kept answering people in Japanese when I would bump into them at the grocery store or something (Sumimasen!) for about a week, which did get me some strange looks. Source(s): Spent a year in a remote fishing village getting a new perspective on life!
Other Travel Tips

Studying Japanese helped a lot. I didn't really make it past Culture Shock until I was functional. It also helped a lot to make some friends.

Reverse Culture Shock really wasn't too bad. I just missed my friends back in Japan. Moving back to America was harder than I thought it would be. A lot more expensive too.
Culture shock is kind of the point, you know. If everything was the same as home, it wouldn't be very interesting. Try to be open to their ideas and don't be afraid to tell them what you think. Some things are just laughable, others admirable. I still live here (7 years), but have more and more problems with America every time I go home. Particularly dirty washrooms in restaurants and gas stations.
i never stayed for a month in Japan but anyway i wanted to share our experience on our short visit to Japan.

There was one time we are roaming around Ikebukuro or Ikesumthing and we got so hungry. Then, my husband and I saw this noodle bar. So, we entered in and wanted to place order with the food attendant. Then, the food attendant pointed to the vending machine. Okay, so we are going to order via vending machine. Upon looking at the menu on the vending machine, all were written in Japanese and the pictures of the noodles are so blurry. Since we are very hungry, we try to operate the vending machine but nothing works. Then there was one customer who was staring and laughing at us. But in the end , this customer(a Taiwanese)helped us and showed us how to order via vending machine. It was an adventure we could never forget.
Though we knew now how to operate the vending machine and place an order, we could never understand if we are getting a cold noodle and hot noodle. So the moral story is not to order anymore from noodle bars but instead go to a curry rice shop which is easier to place an order.

Next, rubbish bins. Never never put the wrong rubbish in their 3-in-one bins or you will look be upon and get a scolding you will never forget and its all in Japanese.
i was stationed there for 2 yrs. and all i can say it was the best thing to happen to me. i miss it so much there is so much to do and the people are so nice there. i enjoyed just walkin around 3 am in the morning to 7 eleven. culture is great especially how advanced they are compared to the rest of the world man their cell phones are like 10 yrs ahead i swear cuz when i left there n the cell i still got from there its still more advanced then the ones in the states. um if ur single club life is awesome.