Moving to a New Country
Moving to a new country
People move to an other country for many reasons: to escape from their exausting routine, a career change, health purpose, but for me it was as part of an University exchange. I’m a moroccan student who live in South Korea since August 2012, and I was suprised of some aspects of this country. I had some experiences that bring me to ask myself new questions and even let me confused sometimes. In fact, there are three things that impressed me most: their similarities, their deceptively quiet nature (which create some misunderstanding) and respect according to their own codes.
When you just come to South Korea, when the excitement of a new experience is past, you get surprised by the homogeneity of Koreans. In this country, everyone is literally alike: physically (more than other Asians like Mongolians or Kazakhs), their clothes’ style is the same, their gestures, their behaviour, their habits, and their tastes also. Koreans don’t like to be mixed, they believe and trust only their “race”. Usually, they stay in groups (only Koreans), move, work, and live in-group. One example is the word –my- don’t exist in Korean, it’s only –our- : my phone became our phone in South Korea. It’s clearly a collective society and not individualist, which explain their resemblance.
Also, Koreans are of a high context culture, since they have the same references and background they mostly act and react in one way. Moreover, they look very calm, not very talkative; they don’t really think deeply, and they give short answers. These facts give them an image of cold and distant people. They are most of them good at their work, that’s why in their logic they don’t need to know more. Actually they are not curious at all, it’s the first time in my life I meet people as much indifferent to knowledge, to foreigners, to others cultures, to “outside” in general. As a Moroccan I’m frustrated very often. In my country people are very warm, they smile often, talk a lot,
People move to an other country for many reasons: to escape from their exausting routine, a career change, health purpose, but for me it was as part of an University exchange. I’m a moroccan student who live in South Korea since August 2012, and I was suprised of some aspects of this country. I had some experiences that bring me to ask myself new questions and even let me confused sometimes. In fact, there are three things that impressed me most: their similarities, their deceptively quiet nature (which create some misunderstanding) and respect according to their own codes.
When you just come to South Korea, when the excitement of a new experience is past, you get surprised by the homogeneity of Koreans. In this country, everyone is literally alike: physically (more than other Asians like Mongolians or Kazakhs), their clothes’ style is the same, their gestures, their behaviour, their habits, and their tastes also. Koreans don’t like to be mixed, they believe and trust only their “race”. Usually, they stay in groups (only Koreans), move, work, and live in-group. One example is the word –my- don’t exist in Korean, it’s only –our- : my phone became our phone in South Korea. It’s clearly a collective society and not individualist, which explain their resemblance.
Also, Koreans are of a high context culture, since they have the same references and background they mostly act and react in one way. Moreover, they look very calm, not very talkative; they don’t really think deeply, and they give short answers. These facts give them an image of cold and distant people. They are most of them good at their work, that’s why in their logic they don’t need to know more. Actually they are not curious at all, it’s the first time in my life I meet people as much indifferent to knowledge, to foreigners, to others cultures, to “outside” in general. As a Moroccan I’m frustrated very often. In my country people are very warm, they smile often, talk a lot,