Job Discussion Forums

[Lyov]

There comes so moments in my day when I am busily immeresed in somthing I've never done before and I'm thinking about new things, or calling my new friends or how to phrase something in a new language and I think 'what am I doing here?' What was so bad about my old culture that I was wanted to leave at all? What turn in my life brought me to the heart of Mongolia (fill in the blank) rather than do get a job at home and raise a family like my people have been doing for X generations?
The first time I left my family they said good luck, see you when you come back. The second time I left they had to realize that somehow, for some reason I was different than them. Why? Why are we different than them? Maybe I am not referring to those of you just counting the days until you go home, but for those who have actually found a new home.
I think its something more than just wanderlust because it seems to me like once I find a job I don't don't get to wander very much. Adventure doesn't work because how can something adventurious be boring? Because sometimes it is very boring. In my experience Adventure seems tied together with irratation because it means something is not going right and your fate is now in another's hands (someone you can't actually communicate with.)
So why do you do it?

[Guest]

That is a very good post.

In my case I woke up 18 months ago and just KNEW what I had to do.

There was no question about should I or will I, just that I had to do it.

Mind you, I had been in a MIND NUMBING job for the previous 25 years with a Boss that took me for granted big time and I was suicidally BORED with my life.

Whatever reason it was, does not matter - what does matter is that now my life has changed in every way and I have never been happier than I have been here over the past 15 months - which is why I will not be returning to Australia - it is out of the question.

[merlin]

Which culture exactly did you abandon? I ask because people seem to describe the modern world as lacking culture. Perhaps it wasn't something you abandoned but a LACK of something. Culture was your word, but perhaps it was a lack of other things?

Perhaps if you (we) can identify what was lacking it'll be easier to pack it up in a suitcase and bring it with us wherever we go.

[spidey]

Lyov,

As your signature says "Trust in God...." but to be more precise...trust in Yourself. You are simply where you are supposed to be. Let the good and the bad times come, simply accept each for what they are. You obviously have an open mind. That is your greatest advantage. Look at yourself objectively as you know you can. See how good your life is and how lucky you are. Your friends and family surely miss you but they probably see you as a person who had the strength to leave the nest and venture out. Don't sell yourself short. What you are doing is by no means easy. I'm sure many people here can attest to that. Myself included.

Trust yourself and the path that life has chosen for you. Your happiness is your own, no matter where you may choose to live.

Spidey

P.S.

Merlin.... nice signature.

[Roger]

A little self-introspection might reveal a few things about yourself: did you really "abandon" your native culture? Or did you simply remove yourself from its static forms and implant it somewhere else where you gain more profile because you are a representative of your culture/

Only we in our modern time can afford to feel bored and to say "I want to experience a new culture'.
were you integrated in a less developed culture that requires you to struggle for your personal survival, culture would suddenly be something rather lofty and artificial!

[Lyov]

I offically say I abandonned my culture. I can see your point of cultural removal but that is not the case with me. It is a choice whether to step in and be a part of something or always be removed by virture of your origins. To call myself a representative of my culture is naive and arrogant because such a tiny percentage of people from my culture do what I am doing that I in no way represent a majority way of thinking. If I offer an opinion it will no doubt contridict with the average american opinion because I am different than them for the very fact that I have left.
Culture as I am using it means everything people do, say and think as memebers of a group. It does not mean the high culture of this and that, that is actually a false usuage. I abandonned my old culture to take on a new one. All people have a culture but it just happens to be completely different. I have no understanding of how culture could be lofty and artifical, I assume you are using the word in the popular usage and not in the anthropologically correct form. If culture were to seem artifical, like people in a play for instance, this is because you do not inhabit their cultural framework. Very possibly your culture would seem artifical to them.
The idea that my culture lacks something is interesting but there is some logical hickups there (but they're not important). Perhaps by being exposed to foreign ideas from books or whatever else gave me a glimpse at a different culture's ways of viewing things. That is something lacking in a single culture. This is semantics though because when a culture takes in a foreign idea it immediatly creases to be foreign. The inside and outside will always remain.
I use the idea of cultural abandonnment with another, more personal, usage in mind as well. I really see culture and language as being very mixed together and certainly I am an english teacher so I can not abandon english but the amount that was given up is amazing. The beauty of being a native speaker is that comprehension in its basic form is at %100 and gives way to whole worlds of nuance and innuendo. This is something that can't be taught. So when I say I abandonned my culture I mean I gave up the possibility of my native cultural progression.
Maybe spidy has it though. One seeks to leave their culture simply due to the lack of alternatives. (I don't know if you could pack that in a suitcase though.) What do you think?

[merlin]

Spidey's one of the most got-it-together personalities on this forum, and I thought that even before he complimented my signature.

I'd like to encourage you to step outside of binary thinking.
on/off
black/white,
east/west,
us/them,
my culture/your culture,
100% conformity to birth culture/100% rejection of birth culture

The problem of binary thinking is it's so limiting. Only two choices.

Who was it that said logic is a good servant but a terrible master?

Of course if your a is already full we may need to get rid of some of the less useful baggage before we you can pack more in it.

Or maybe a bigger suitcase would be a better idea?

Anyone have a better metaphor than a suitcase?

[Sweetsee]

I agree with Merlin about Spidey. I also salute Merlin as one of the got-it-together personalities here.

You guys rock! And the OP rocks for writing such an introspective post.

I too, left America and according to my small circle of friends am somewhat of a world conquerer. One day while visiting my old friends I was told that I was the only one they knew who had made it in the world outside their small community.

I never looked at it that way. For me, I simply followed my heart.

Similarly, while living and working in SE Asia I had people constantly coming up to me at the bar flabbergasted that I was serving them drinks. They always asked me, "Do you live here?", as though that weren't entirely possible. They looked at me as if to ask how is that possible. I told them to quit their job, quit their apartment and buy an airline ticket to the destination of their dreams. Of course, that wasn't how I came to be serving them drinks there but they are not me.

Those of us who live abroad we are different from those back home. We are residents of earth with no allegiance to one country. We are great communicators and can adapt and seek the challenges of different cultures. We exhalt in foreign culture and enjoy sharing the innate characteristics of our own culture. [/i]

[jpvanderwerf2001]

Why do I do it?
Please check the likely (at this point) results of the US Presidential election.
Brainwashed rubes. (No, I'm totally not bitter.)

[Lyov]

I really can not agree with you that my last post was an example of binary thinking. My point is that being a member of a culture is choice and I have made the choice to not be a part of it therefore I say I abandonned it. Culture means being a member of a group, if you are no longer involved with a group of your people you then can not say that you are still a member of your original culture. That doesn't mean you've abandonned it but just perhaps put it aside. I say abandonned because, thats the choice i've made.
I sense by your posts that the concept of culture has somewhat mystical connotations to you. Conceptually I could say that is accurate if you take mystical ideas to simply a cover for something very hard to understand. The great reason why culture is so difficult to understand is because it is imbedded, below the line of consciousness. Most people live their entire lives without a proper awareness of what the concept means or how it effects them. Without a proper understanding of one's own culturally embedded ideas it is not really possible to leave your culture because the very way in which you structure and formulate ideas was part of that culture. Its a lot more than just saying 'I am no longer a part of this or that' it's a full transformation of the consciousness.

[spidey]

Lyov....nice one.

How about this for an idea...

To view the world as many different cultures can be at times very destructive. Wouldn't you say? If we were to think of the world as ONE culture that is diversified with its many peoples, then wouldn't it be quite impossible for you to abandon it or even become seperated from it?
This is what I offer to you...the fact that you did not abandon anything at all, but merely that you moved to a different part of it.

The Human Culture is so diversified that we have come to think of it as not ONE but MANY. This I would dare to say is inherently false and very problematic indeed.

Just an idea...

S

[Roger]

That's the way I see it too, Spidey! To me, all these "cultures" are subcultures. CLinging to one national or ethnic expression of their "culture" is an attempt at separating oneself from the rest of humanity and the defining quality of humanness.

[spidey]

Yes Roger...

Such is the DUALITY of the human species. The need to be part of a SOCIETY along with the overpowering desire to be an INDIVIDUAL.

Come here...go away!

[prplfairy]

The question is not really whether we are inclined to define ourselves and all we interact with in terms of duality,that much is obvious, but rather how do you free yourself from duality. The first as has been suggested is to not ask yourself wheter or not you rejected your culture but to ask a more open ended question like what did you do?

Persoanlly, I was not disillusioned with my country or my life. In fact I had it pretty good. My desire to explore was not a reaction to my environment but the realization that there is alot of world out there and as easy as travel and working abroad is the only restrictions are self imposed. Once you decide to release yourself then you can go anywhere and do anything. For me this realization meant just that and I've lived in Europe and Asia for several years. I was hoping for a Kerry victory to go back to when I do head back but I realize the man in the oval will not be essential to my real happiness. I find that those people who are unhappy at home will be unhappy abroad. Simply changing locales is not always enough of a catalyst for personal growth.

I find this topic interesting because in Hong Kong we seem to have a lot of people who left home for the wrong reasons, that being usually to make more money or to recover from mind numbing jobs or long term relationships.

[Ariadne]

You have probably all heard this, but it fits with the theme.

A man drives into a new town and stops a fellow on the street to ask about the town and its inhabitants. The fellow on the street asks, "What kind of town do you come from and what were the people like?" The man answers, "It was a terrible town and the folks were unfriendly." The fellow on the street responds, "Well you better not try to settle here then because the folks are unfriendly and its a terrible place to live." The man decides to keep looking and drives on.

A few days later, a woman drives into town and encounters the same fellow on the street. She is moving and wants to know about the town and its people. The fellow asks about her old town and she says, "Oh, it was such a great town! The people were so friendly." The fellow on the street responds, "Well isn't that a coincidence! This is a wonderful town and the people are the friendliest you will ever find."