Does Culture fail to Shock?


When moving to a new country, there is much talk about “culture shock,” where inadvertently you discover that not everyone has heard of Shah Rukh Khan, forget Koffee with Karan Johar; where walking is interpreted as a sign of your cycle having been stolen and where Nutella wins over peanut butter as a choice of spread. But the truth of the matter is that this is not really a “shock” to the system as for it to jolt you, it has to confront you immediately.

In fact, momentum and pace is at the heart of such eureka moments, which, contrary to popular belief, creeps up on you at the most unexpected of times or perhaps never! You could be walking by the Marijuana Museum in Amsterdam everyday, oblivious to the fact that there is, after all, a museum on this much-adored weed. This term “culture shock”, although a cliché, is in fact barely representative of what one goes through when one shifts geographies. After all, we don’t just travel with our material luggage, we move with our well-encased worldviews that neatly insulates us from the new surrounds that you plunge into. So it is very much possible to float along for years without actually attending to what could possibly shock you. And when we do attend, it is often at the peripheral observation of confirming your deep-seated notions of how people are, in general, strange. Maybe you even celebrate your normalcy by accepting without much probing into the peculiar ways of the new tribe. Thereby, its not a shock, its an affirmation of all what you’ve held dear for so long.

“Shock” requires us to believe that people are inherently like you. Given that we live in a time of celebrated narcissism, that sensation will need to be earned. That said, if you were a brand manager, you can see why, “culture non-shock but a mild surprise” does not do the trick. We expect a punch but what often we get is a tap on the shoulder. But few, turn around nevertheless.

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