Reverse Culture Shock
I&#x27;ve lived in other countries a handful of times for fairly brief periods (no longer than 6 months), and it is really true. I&#x27;ve know some people who&#x27;ve spent years abroad, come back to the U.S. and nope right back out as fast as they can find employment back where they came from.<p>It&#x27;s not a statement about the quality of a place, but really having to go through an adjustment to get used to your new home and then having to readjust back to where you came from (only you keep telling yourself you shouldn&#x27;t have to since it&#x27;s your home) and then constant comparisons between places, which you already did as part of your learning of a new place, but now you start to see all the bad stuff about where you&#x27;re from, but you were used to doing the reverse instead.<p>It takes a while for all the differences to average out in your mind.<p>I don&#x27;t think I&#x27;ve ever had to too bad, but I&#x27;ve definitely spent a few weeks angry at how terrible Americans drive after coming back from Germany, or how bad service is when coming back from Korea.<p>But I&#x27;ve also had kind of the opposite feeling. After one long stay in Germany, and feeling very foreign, I remember coming home and it not really registering that it happened until I got in the taxi and the driver was playing some R&amp;B. I&#x27;m not even an R&amp;B fan but the <i>Americaness</i> of it, after hearing weeks of Europop, hit me like a stick and I suddenly felt very very home.