Job Discussion Forums

[Jester18]

I've been overseas now for quite some time now and when I head back home every now and then I find it harder and harder to relate to people back home. They just don't seem to understand or want to understand what life is like overseas. They seem a bit naive at times to me!
Here's an example----one of my friends in Taiwan went back to the States and talked to his friends about the time he paid a riverboat captain to take him down the Mekong in Vietnam and one of his friends replied----"oh I know what you mean---we spent 2 weeks in Maine last summer"
Not the same in my book! I've even been contacted by an ex-girlfriend who is bored with her marriage and she had the nerve to ask me if she left her husband----could I easily bring in 100K a year to make us happy----hell---I'm married and had no desire to get back together with her, but in her warped mind she thought that since my wife is Asian that I would prefer to dump her and get back together with a white American girl----somehow the wires must have gotten crossed in our emails. Anyway, I cut off all contact with her.
Anyway, I've gone on a tangent! I'm just curious to hear about your experiences with the "less-educated" back home.
What are some of the dumbest questions you've had thrown at you by friends and family.
For Example: "So, are they still eating rice over there in Korea?"
"Wow---they have fax machines in Saudi!"
And just any general observations you've made about those guys back home!!!!! Thanks

[ls650]

I find that people simply aren't that interested, one way or the other. If the subject comes, people ask a few polite questions ("So, do you like it there? I bet it's hot, huh?") and then change the subject to something they can relate to more easily.

[Perpetual Traveller]

I hear you, generally the only people I will try to talk about travelling with are those I know are kindred spirits. But by the same token when I am talking to people who aren't I don't really have a whole lot of interest in their stories of their children and houses etc so I guess it works both ways.

The questions that usually annoy me the most are the ones like "Aren't you scared to go there?" I always try to reply diplomatically.

PT

[Jester18]

I get that one all the time since I'm in Saudi.
Although I can't really stand living in Saudi and I'm counting down the days till I leave----I still tell people back home that I feel safer here than in any big American city! That throws them for a loop----some people think that I'm in cohoots w/ Osama---haha!!! They just have no clue.
It was the same when I was in Korea, Taiwan and the UAE----"Oh--aren't you afraid that Kim Jung Il will attack --- or the Chinese will attack or blah blah blah!! I just ignored them most of the time!
I even got asked by one friend if the Vietnamese hated me ( I was living in Korea at the time) and when the tsunami hit in SE Asia in 2004 I got emails from friends asking me if I was alright (I was in Saudi at the time)
And my favorite-----when I was in Korea---people would ask if I was living in North or South Korea> I think they need a big geography lesson back home!

[guangho]

[tedkarma]

Part of the cultural readjustment training when I was in the Peace Corps was to let you know that people back home really aren't interested. They have their own lives to live and to get on with. A trainer suggested taking no more than FIVE photographs to show your relatives. You'll notice that after about that five their eyes start to glaze over!

Maybe important too - to remember that relationships are reciprocal. I guess we need to sincerely ask them about their favorite TV shows and how that same old job is doing . . . without OUR eyes glazing over.

[Calories]

I haven't been back home yet but, I had a conversation with my mom on msn that went something like this:

mom: do they have baby food in china?
me: uh, yes but I usually avoid that aisle since babies and pregnant woman make me nauseous
mom: well, I think you should eat some of it. it has fruit in it.
me: why would I eat baby food? They do have fruit in China.
mom: oh they do? I had no idea. You said you didn't like the food over there.


And this woman has a phd?! Ah, some people can be so smart and so stupid at the same time. When I was living 'up north' in Ontario, I convinced her that the city of North Bay was shut down twice a year for the moose stampeeds. She believed it for a good half hour until my father decided to enlighten her on the behavoir of moose or is that meese or maybe moosi?

[Bayden]

[rrooseve]

I totally agree with you. I studied in Germany for a year, and coming back and trying to talk to people was so hard, although it should have been easy speaking the same native language. People just don't have a clue what's out there, and what's even worse is that they don't even want to know. The people I can't stand are those born and raised in big cities and think that the world begins and ends with their city. Some people are just so close-minded. The best conversations I have are with other travelers, and we don't even have to be talking about traveling.

[rusmeister]

I'm with all you guys. I was in Russia for the 1991 coup (and for many years after) and while my parents worried while it was splashed over the news, my tales of my various adventures met the same general fate as yours.

I read part of a book by an American woman who did time in Saudi Arabia and expressed the concept like a "suitcase" that you can open up and show a few things out of, and that's all.

So yeah, all experiences of the sort "When I was in the coup in Ruritania..." tend to get cut off by "Oh, really? Well, did you hear about the new mall they're building on East Street?"

They have no experience enabling them to relate.

Think of the hobbits returning to the Shire in LOTR. They had changed and grown. Their neighbors back home didn't.

I guess you have to become a leader or leave. Lead or leave, baby!

[JZer]

[White_Elephant]

The only family I have back home is my mother. We haven't always had the best relationship but I would say that things have improved greatly as we communicate over the web and internet phone. She's always sending me funny pictures and stories. I show them to people and they get a real kick out of them too. My mother hasn't asked me any real stupid questions. She's very interested in my life "over here." I get emails like this:

"Hi ...., Hope you are feeling better today. I went to the State Fair yesterday. And I got to ride an Elephant. They were African Elephants. What a thrill! You looked like you were having sooooo much fun on the Elephant in your picture I had to try it too. Also we got to see a calf be born in the miracle of life barn. What a great day. How is schooling going? Mom"

and yet I get the stranger than strange emails that sometimes make it harder to relate to such as this:

:"Hi .......So good to hear from you and did you get to pick up the Dog? If you can, send me some more pictures of your travels and your dog. Sara May my kitty with the extra toes had her kittens. She had 5 and 3 of them have extra toes. They are really cute. I don't know how much I will as for them yet. Getting extra toed kittens from a breeder just doesn't happen. These are the cat's from Ernest Hemingway. He has a home in Key West Florida where these cats run and play. Glad to hear you met so many wonderful people in the Phillipines. I did get your other pictures made on yahoo pictures and they made me copies and sent them to me. How cool is that? Well have a blessed day. Love Mom"

Yep "extra toes" is definately hard to relate to. I'm sorry.

[jr1965]

I find that I can relate pretty well to family and friends back in the States. I think this has a lot to do with the fact that we keep in touch regularly on email (now, that is. Back in the early to mid 90s when I was in Asia for a few years this wasn't really possible). I also invite them to come and visit me wherever I happen to be living. I've had friends and family stay with me in countries I lived in Asia and now Europe. Other times, I've met up with them in other countries close by.

Here's where I feel like some people back in the States just don't get it at times: they seem to think that b/c I'm living in another country that my life is somehow more exciting or interesting than their lives are. But is it? I mean one of my friends wakes up every day to a spectacular view of the Golden Gate Bridge. Another has just bought a small house in the same city, has taken it down to the stubs and is rebuilding and rewiring the whole thing on her own. I think that's amazing. A third friend is working on her first novel. A fourth just had her first baby (which is a pretty wild experience itself if you've ever asked a woman what it was like to go through it). Another is working in the same job she's had for years, but recently, I learned that she's thinking about giving it up and trying something new. That's pretty cool. All of these things are happening back in my hometown in the US. So why is it that b/c I live in a European capital within walking distance of a palace that my experiences are somehow more interesting or worthy of discussing? I don't think they necessarily are.

[JZer]

[denise]

I can relate to the folks back home because the friends that I have kept in touch with either a) are fellow EFL teachers or b) still care about me and want to know how my life is going, if I am happy, etc. My parents are interested, too. My dad was in the Navy for many years and has seen much of the world. He always has stories to tell about the places I live in. My mom didn't really start traveling until I started living abroad, but she is always interested in learning new things. She has visited me in Prague, Japan, and Peru.

And as for the people who don't care... well, if they don't care, then they're not the sort of people who I want to hang onto as friends! I definitely value quality over quantity, and if I find myself drifting apart from someone who has no interest in my life (and in whose life I have no interest...), then, well, it's always sad to lose touch, but if it happens, it happens.

d