Cultural Adjustment and Transition

"I have never used electricity. So I imagine that it is very hard for me to do that." Eating a package of butter. Learning how to throw trash in a garbage can instead of out the window. Eating a doughnut for the first time. Trying to figure out how Santa Claus is connected with the birth of Jesus.

These are just a few of the moments shown on the YouTube clip below. They were taken from the documentary God Grew Tired of Us, which chronicles the adjustment of several of the Lost Boys of Sudan to life in the United States. They make some very interesting and honest observations about life and people here in the US. 

So what does it feel like to adjust to a new culture? I am pretty sure sometime in your life you have made a big change. Maybe it was graduating from high school and going to college or moving from one place to another. During this change you went through a transition and got a small glimpse of what it is like to adjust to a new culture. You went from a place you knew to place you didn't and place where you were known to a place you weren't. Something as simple as making friends or figuring out how to buy food all of a sudden was different.

How to make this transition, adjust and thrive in a new culture is just one of the topics we have been learning about here at Cultural Orientation for Personal Effectiveness (COPE). I have spent the last two weeks at COPE, which is being held at Trinity Western University in Langley, British Columbia Canada. Today is our final day of training. I will share a lot more in the coming weeks about topics we have learned about here and tell you more about this experience.