The International Student Blog

As we are starting a new semester, I thought I would cover a few topics that deal with some of the things you will be experiencing. I have already covered how to make new friends and so today I thought I would cover the topic of adjusting to your new life, or what has been termed “Culture Shock”.

So what is Culture Shock? Essentially this is the feeling you get when you are adapting to your new surrounding and can take many forms such as sadness/ loneliness, lack of confidence, longing for family, feelings of being lost, etc.. For many international students this may happen within the first few weeks as you are not sure how to react to things, what is appropriate behaviour, what is not appropriate behaviour, and generally trying to adjust to new surroundings.

Of course not all students will experience this, but for those that do it is important that you do not let it get on top of you as the feelings will pass and with time you will learn how things work in your new host country. Of course doing things like keeping in touch with your family and friends back home, joining clubs and groups and talking to your fellow students will always help!

Also – remember that if you really need help talk to your international student office at school. They will be best placed to help you and are there to help you!

This entry was posted on Friday, August 18th, 2006 at 10:03 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.