Cultural stress

Cultural stress is distinctly different from other kinds of stress. Cultural stress is what happens when you feel like an idiot because you didn't know the system and got in the wrong line. It is not being able to easily communicate what you need, or not being understood when you are doing so. It is walking past your favorite noodle stand only to have the smell make you crave grilled cheese and veggie sticks, and not noodles. Anything but noodles.  Cultural stress is what happens when you realize it is actually harder, longer, and more expensive to do something in your home country but you're going to wait anyhow because you just can't face another unknown, another thing to figure out. It is wanting to watch mindless television that you can actually understand. It is wanting to be able to understand your friends (culturally, not linguistically) and wishing they could understand you. It is being totally overwhelmed by the list of errands you have for the first few days you are home, and then realizing it is no big deal because you actually know where to get those items, or how to get them, or how to get yourself to that store. Cultural stress is being tired, not necessarily of anything in particular, but just tired, and feeling the weight of being an out of place foreigner in a very real way, even though nothing specific has happened.

By the time I land in Detroit on Saturday night, it will be 11 months and 2 days since I was last in my home culture, aside from a short overnight layover in Chicago last July. That's a long time for me, the longest I have ever been out of the US. And even though I am no longer in my first year here, the compounding factor of those 11 months and 2 days means that I am really feeling the cultural stress these days. Add to that the end of the school year stress and the stress of all the events that the month of June holds, and I am a bit of a wreck. Today, I managed to only dissolve into tears a few times and threaten my students with the firing squad once, or maybe twice.

I am so so blessed to be here, and I love my life in Thailand, but God Bless America, I can't wait to be on US soil!

Stepping Outside My Culture Zone

One of the things I am learning a lot about by living in Thailand is what it feels like to be a minority.  There are several ways I can wind up in the minority here- linguistically, religiously, racially, or culturally.  I don't notice it all the time out in public, but I do still feel conspicuous some times, and the language part can have its stressful moments.  It is not often here that I am in the cultural minority since so many of my friends are Americans or other Westerners, so it is easy to live in Thailand and not often experience the joy of observing another culture closely or the stress of being emerged in a set of rules with which I am not familiar.

This weekend in Singapore, I had that opportunity.  As Sunday was the end of Chinese New Year, my aunt and uncle were gathering with their family for dinner and they invited me along.  Nothing paints a culture for you like attending a holiday with them.

We walked across the street to my uncle's parent's house where his other siblings, nieces, and nephews had already arrived.  Much like my family, most people were milling about the living room visiting while a few finished getting the food and tables ready.  I smiled when I saw that there were two tables, one being the designated 'kids table', just like we always had (some things, I guess are universal).

Before dinner a small coffee table covered in newspaper was brought into the middle of the room. On it was a platter with piles of different shredded vegetable and raw salmon.  Sauce and peanuts were poured on top and everyone crowded around with a pair of chopsticks and then worked together to mix the salad.  It was fun, and I soon realized why the platter was surrounded by newspaper.

Then we all sat down for hot pot with heaping piles of pork, beef, and seafood all around.  Everyone happily started dropping meat into the broth as family banter bounced around the table.  Sat between my aunt and uncle, my plate was never empty.  At one point everyone was fighting over a meat that I did not recognize.  My aunt took a piece and put half of it on my plate.  She said she'd only let me know what it was after I tried it...  I did, and it wasn't bad, if a bit gelatinous.  I think it was pig skin or something. I tried several other new things that I can't remember, and even ate part of a black egg (I can't remember what they are soaked in), something I had cleverly avoided so far in Bangkok.  It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected it to be, and in fact, I didn't dislike it.  Not sure I'd go as far as saying I liked it though.

The meal was delicious and fun, and I ate way too much.  My favorites were the pork meatballs and the shrimp.  After hot pot I had a bowl of broth and then some Korean ramen-style noodles to finish things off.  We followed dinner with a chocolate birthday cake for two of the teenagers, which I somehow made space for.  It was a fun evening and my uncle's family was so welcoming.  When I got there he had introduced me to everyone, but it wasn't until dinner was nearly over that his sister realized that I was that Clare, the one from Ann Arbor, the little girl.

The foods may not have been turkey and stuffing, but it still felt a lot like sitting down to a big family Thanksgiving dinner, everyone having their favorite bits of the meal.  It was so much worth the bit of uncomfortableness that comes from trying to pick up on the correct cultural way to do things and knowing the whole time that you're not quite getting it.  But at least my chopsticks skills are slowly coming along. 

Again for the first time.

Enjoying the time with my brother here greatly, though we've had a few "well, this is Thailand" moments.  Mostly it's been pretty smooth.  It's been fun to "see Thailand again for the first time" through his eyes.  And as I've been reflecting on Advent this week it has kind of made me with that I could "hear the Christmas story again for the first time" and really catch the wonder of it all.  I feel like in many ways I've heard it and seen it interpreted in so many ways for so many years that I don't fully catch its staggering wonder anymore. 

I am wrapping up the semester with some babysitting, I mean, class parties, this morning and then we head to Cambodia this afternoon.  We're taking lots of pictures that I will post eventually. 

Thai Massage

It occurred to me today that I have neglected to blog about a very important aspect of Thai culture:  the Thai massage.  Massage is huge here. I mean, HUGE.  Practically every block in Bangkok has a massage place. You can get a "regular" oil massage or a foot massage, but tonight I went for the traditional Thai massage.  Unless you're going somewhere really fancy, if you're paying more than $10 for an hour massage, you're paying too much.  Every time I go I ask myself why I don't do this every week.  Perhaps for a New Year's resolution...

I like a good Thai massage in some ways it's part massage and part really good stretch.  You wear little jammies that are like scrubs, which is nice on so many levels.  Not only are you just more comfortable, it also makes it something you can do with friends.  You lay on a small mattress on the floor while the masseuse massages, stretches, pulls, presses, sits and generally contorts you in a variety of wonderful ways. 

Today I was feeling particularly tight all over, waaaay too tight and stressed in the shoulders for it to only be Monday, so I felt a massage was in order.  Now wanting to make things any more stressful and complicated than they already were, I opted to just go to the massage place here at my apartment complex.  Better places exist, but it's a good little spot and quite convenient, and today I got the World's Hardest Massage, which was just what the doctor ordered. 

And now to sit back with my tea and Christmas carols by the light of my tree and advent wreath...

When you're climbing up a ladder...

... and you're feeling something splatter- c'mon folks, you know how it goes- Diarrhea, diarrhea! 

I have found a very interesting cultural difference here in Thailand, surrounding this very phenomenon. In the States, we may sing about it on occasion, but we certainly don't talk about it.
Stomach's a little off. 
GI problems. 
Tummy's rumbling a bit. 

Or if we're being really brave and in comfortable company we might say I've got the runs. 

Or a million other lines we come up with to avoid that one horrible word that no one wants to say and let's be honest- no one really wants to hear about.

In Thailand, however, it's quite different.  If a friend asks how I am, I might easily tell them I have a headache, and Thais just as easily and nonchalantly say that they have diarrhea.  It still gets me every time.  Students have no problem coming up and telling me that they have diarrhea and might need to "make a run for it" in the middle of class.  I'm still slightly embarrassed for them. 

I'm not sure why the difference- why it's such a taboo word in American culture and yet so openly discussed here.  Maybe it's more prevalent here, but maybe all of the US has the runs and no one talks about it.  We'll never know...

A Song and Dance with Dinner

Went to dinner with some friends after church today. You know, just your normal hot pot place that's on every street in Bangkok.  And there we were, in the middle of hot pot and deep conversation, when a song came on and all the hostesses and waitstaff took their positions and started dancing.  In unison.  Real cheesy like.  As if it were the most normal thing in the world.  Funnily enough, our table of foreigners seemed to be the only one that really noticed.  As everyone else carried on with their meal, we stopped and admired and commented, and of course, snapped a picture. 

Queen's Birthday

Yesterday was the queen's birthday, which means two things.  First, yesterday was Mother's Day, and second, today we have the day off in her honor.  Last night there was a big ceremony and celebration at the Grand Palace downtown.  I went to an afternoon church service and then out to dinner with friends. They had the ceremony on the TV's at the restaurant and at one point they started passing out candles to all the patrons at the restaurant. They were the little hand-held kind like what you would use during Silent Night at a Christmas Eve service.

So when everyone on the stage and in the crowd at the palace lit their candles, we also all stood and lit ours (restaurant employees included).  There was a small stage at the restaurant for live music and several well dressed people (employees?) stood on the stage with their candles.  We stood and sang the king's anthem along with the TV, and then another royal song I didn't recognize.  And at one point in the song we all lifted our lit candles in the queen's honor. 

It was a nice little surprise to get to watch and participate in a Thai cultural moment.  We just don't get that kind of stuff in the US! 

O Beautiful for Spacious Skies

I don't always give the US the credit it's due, so in honor of her birthday, these are some of the things I appreciate most about my home country:

• Diversity. It's often one of the first things I notice when I touch down in the US.  I love that we are a country that is full of diversity in our ethnicity, language, culture, landscape, climate, and opinions. 
• Generosity. For all the bad press about greedy banks and selfish attitudes, I think Americans are on the whole a very generous population. When crises arise- be it next door or across the world- we are quick to send aid or lend a helping hand. 
• Cleanliness. From tap water to city streets to daily showers, few nations have such a strong sense of cleanliness and I very much appreciate it. 
• Freedom. Having lived and traveled in countries where your words and actions are more closely monitored and regulated, where freedom of speech and freedom of the press are still not a reality, it's nice to know that here, while you may be fired or hated for saying certain things, you're not going to be arrested for it and while your political or religious views may be unpopular, they won't put you or your family in danger.  
• Organization.  If the USA had a Myers-Briggs personality type, she would be a J. Argentina and Thailand would be P's.  And my love for the US's J-ness is not just because I am a J. Try to accomplish anything, especially something official, in a P country and you too will love the smoothness with which many things can be accomplished here.  (Actually, now that I think about it, the US would probably be an ENTJ)

Happy Birthday, USA!

All circumstances: thoughts on contentment

Funny how sometimes being home makes me homesick.  It's like a big giant reminder of what I miss when I'm gone.  Yesterday I got to hang out with one of my dearest friends, meet her newborn, and spend time with her older two kids.  I'd never gotten to hear the two year old speak a complete sentence before, but as I walked in the door cradling a warm loaf of blueberry bread wrapped in a tea towel he looked at me quizzically and asked, "You have a new baby too?"  I miss watching him grow up, and I feel that all the more keenly when I do get to spend time with him.  His older sister told me at dinner that maybe when she got a little bigger she could come with me to Thailand :)  And it amazed me how sad I felt leaving their house after a lovely few hours. It wasn't sadness over this visit so much as sadness at all the visits I don't get to have. 

Paul writes about being content in all circumstances- as in having plenty or being in want.  For me, content in all circumstances means content in all locations.  It means that when I am in Thailand, I live in Thailand, and that when I am in the States I am fully present with those here.  And when I have special times, like next month in Argentina, to be fully there and enjoy the company of friends that I don't often get to see.

I don't foresee this tension between places ever going away.  I cannot be in all three places at once and no matter where I am, I miss someone's wedding or someone's birth, someone's grief or growing vocabulary.  So instead I find a way to live in that tension- to celebrate the weddings I do get to attend, the newborns (in several countries) that I do get to snuggle, the lives that I do get to walk alongside.  I live in that tension because I know that God has called me to be content even in the sadness of the things I miss.  I can be content because it grows out of the core foundation on my being in Christ.  So whether I'm sipping tea in Michigan, mate in Buenos Aires, or cha yen in Bangkok, I know that it is not culture or location that defines my contentment.  That lies much deeper, in doing what God has called me to and walking beside him each day. 

I want to do better at this.  I want to rest more easily in this contentment, in this struggle that so many of us face, not just the ones who move overseas.  The world challenges our contentment in so many ways.  So I do what I can to fix my eyes on Christ- the only way we're ever going to escape the tensions of having and wanting and of being and not being- so that we too can say, I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am (Philippians 4:11).

The Sewing Lady

This is not an uncommon sight in Bangkok, but it is one that has perplexed me since I got here. I pass this woman frequently when I get off the sky train downtown.  Her sewing machine is set up on the side of a busy road, and she's always busy working when I walk by.  What I can't tell is what she does exactly.  Does she make clothes, or simply repair and tailor them?  If she makes them, where does she sell them? If she's repairing and tailoring, where do her customers come from? I've certainly never seen someone stop by and drop things off or pick them up or have them fitted :)  She has a huge bag of fabric or clothes next to her.  If she's making the clothes to sell elsewhere, why does she "set up shop" here?  Are there any perks to putting her machine on the side of the road?  It odd for me to see her there- a very "developing world" sight on the side of one of the more modern streets in Bangkok. 

Learning from each other.

Five things that I wish Thailand would learn from The US:
1. Lane lines are there to tell you where to drive your car.  The idea is to stay between the two lines so that you don't hit anyone and they don't hit you :)
2. The art of a really good salad- multiple kinds of dark lettuce and spinach with a variety of fresh veggies, with a bit of meat or cheese or eggs on top.
3. Treated tap water.
4. Cheese.  Cheese is delicious. Cheese can do many things. Cheese should not cost an arm and a leg.
5. Public education should be free all the way through high school graduation.  School fees past 6th grade, no matter how small, prevent too many kids from learning and having more opportunities in life.

Five things that I wish The US would learn from Thailand:
1. The sun is harmful to your skin. Tan is not cool.
2. Clothes dryers are a luxury, not a necessity.  Line drying is economically and ecologically better, and never shrinks anything.
3. The art of cheap food and eating lunch for $2.
4. There's rarely a need for public displays of anger- yelling, screaming, complaining, and griping under your breath are distasteful and won't get you anywhere. 
5.  Bookstores are valuable- real live bookstores with real live books in them.

It's a small soup

It's a small soup around here, and the world that we call international Christian education is a small soup as well, which I guess is my way of saying, "It's a small world after all" without getting the song stuck in my head. 

Here are a few examples to illustrate these points:

One.  I live on campus, making the soup very small indeed. The place is crawling with students all the time, as you might expect.  Sometimes my interactions with them are quite amusing.  Today, as I arrived home from grocery shopping, two of my students were loitering outside the building where I live.  "Hi Miss Clare," one of them calls cheerfully to me, "I was just talking to [insert friend's name here] about fractions."   Riiiiight. The perfect welcome home from the grocery store. 

Two. On Saturday I was at Nak Suu and was invited to hang out with the staff who run it at their dance off/ fundraiser Saturday evening.  So I figured I'd go and support them and the outreach trip they are going on next month.  Well, their turn out was kind of low, except for the fact that the directors' kids invited all their friends.  The directors' daughter is in my class.  So there I was, doing the dance off thing, while being cheered on by a group of my lovely students.

Three.  I was sitting at a sidewalk cafe yesterday afternoon, in a neighborhood downtown. Across the road was HOBS: The House of Beers yes Mike, we can go when you are here). I look up and see a group of farang (foreigners) walking in- among them a girl who looked very familiar... finally I was able to place her. She teaches at a NICS school in SE Asia and I recognized her from the pictures of a friend who also worked at that school.  Maybe this week is their spring break??

Four.  We were talking at a department meeting the other day about people on our staff who had taught together previously- in other countries.  You'd be amazed at how many their are. While I never taught with any ICS staff, there is another new teacher here who used to teach in Suriname with my former roommate from Argentina (who is now teaching in Kenya...). 

It's a small, small soup.

The Western/Asian Literacy vs. Numeracy Discussion

A few months ago, there was a discussion on our family blog regarding education in America, which led to me putting words to some of my thoughts about teaching math across three continents.  Today, during a math committee meeting, a similar discussion ensued, which has me thinking about it all over again. 

Why does the stereotype exist that Asians are good at math, and is there any truth to it?  If it is true, why?

For starters, I will say that I have seen a trend in my Asian students in Michigan, Argentina, and Thailand- they're overall stronger in math.  For example, in Michigan, our math department was constantly under pressure because of our low math scores (granted, all our scores were low, but our math scores were exceptionally low).  In Argentina, my highest math students were often my Korean kids.  Here, I teach the 'lower track' of 8th grade math and have a disproportionate number of Western kids in my classes.  My 6th graders (who haven't been tracked yet) are far beyond where my 6th graders were in the US, and even further than they were in Argentina where roughly a third were Korean.  As one teacher said today, "If one of my kids is low in math, they're probably blonde." 

The gap exists.  But why?  This is my theory.  Math has a higher value placed on it in Asian culture than in Western culture (or at least, American culture).  Evidence #1 for this is that many of my Asian students work with special math tutors outside of the classroom, not being they are doing poorly, but to get ahead and do well in math. In the US, the only kids with math tutors were kids that already struggled.  And even then many of them didn't have tutors.  The second thing is this.  In the first critical years of life, in the US, we put a huge emphasis on reading. Think about it. What is every parent concerned about in their Kinder or 1st grade conference?  How's my child doing in reading?  From the very first things we start teaching our toddlers, we focus on literacy.  Recognizing letters and their sounds. Being able to read and write.  The ability to communicate.  What is it that "good parents" do?  Read to their kids!  If a 4 year old can read, but barely count past 10, we think little of it.  When we play car games on long trips, we identify letters in the world around us, later on we play word games.  We, in American culture, place a smaller value on numeracy.  I would be curious to know what percent of the minutes of a Kindergarten or First grader's day is related to literacy vs. numeracy.

Now, hear this: the focus on literacy is not a bad thing (remember I am a language arts major and math minor, and that this is the first school where I have not taught both subjects).  I don't blast the time spent on literacy as a waste, I just wonder if maybe the Asian system is a bit more balanced.  What if we taught our two year olds not just how to count, but how to skip count, assign numbers to objects to count the cheerios, put them together and take them away to see how many there are now?  What if we talked about the hands on the clock more or did mental math as a game in the car or played with a ruler at a  hockey game (as I did with my first grade cousin over break) making up games of measuring things around us?  What if we sat down at the conference and yes, asked how their reading was, but was equally concerned about their numerical sense?  What if we kept tallies and made graphs of the number of minutes we spent reading each day?  What if we talked aloud with our kids about how we calculated the amount of tip we're going to leave after dinner or about the sale price of a sweater that is 20% off? 

I don't believe that Asians are genetically more gifted in mathematics. It's possible, yes, but I just don't see it.  I have plenty of Asian kids that struggle (especially in a school with such a high percent of Asians) and I have plenty of Western kids that excel (not to mention my cousins who would knock the socks off any Asian math test).  But I do see trends here; trends that we would be wise not to ignore, not to brush off as cartoons and jokes.  The future is in technology, and so much of technology, like the rest of the world, is mathematically based.  And if all my students could grow up in homes where they are given a strong base in both literacy and numeracy, and attend schools where they are given time and strategies to develop both in literacy and numeracy, then well, other than being out of a job, I'd be pretty happy :)

A cultural home

This morning I read something that resonated deeply within me as I resettle into my adopted culture and adjust to being away from my home culture.  Henri Nouwen is so often able to put words to thoughts I hadn't known that I'd thought, and this was no exception.  This is what struck me so much:

"Being back in France makes me think much about countries and cultures.  During the past few months I have been in Holland, Germany, Canada, the United States, and England, and in all these countries  I have had intense contact with people and their ways of living, praying, and playing.  There is great temptation to want to know which culture is best and where I am most happy and at home.  But this way of thinking leads to endless frustrations because the Dutch, Germans, the French, the Americans, and the Canadians are all people who have unique ways of feeling, thinking, and behaving, none of which totally fits my needs, but all of which have gifts for me... I am increasingly aware of how important it is to enjoy what is given and to fully live where one is...

Do we really need to belong to one country or one culture?  In our world, where distances are becoming less each day, it seems important to become less and less dependent on one place, one language, one culture, or one style of life, but to experience oneself as a member of the human family, belonging to God and free to be wherever we are called to be.  I even wonder if the ability to be in so many places so quickly and so often is not an invitation to grow deeper in the spirit and let our identity be more rooted in God and less in the place in which we happen to be."  (emphasis mine)

These words bring me so much comfort as I feel the pulls of the US, Thailand, and Argentina.  I relate to different aspects of each culture and yet none of them fits me completely.  I feel so blessed to be able to live in and experience different cultures, different faces of God really, and to take away what I can from each one. 

One foot, two foot, red foot, blue foot

And so begins the classic Dr. Seuss book. 

Before coming to Thailand I read a number of books or articles with "do's and don't" for Thai culture. It wouldn't surprise me if at least half of them had to do with feet.  Feet are a tricky thing here- for Westerners at least.  I read a lot of things about being careful about crossing your legs (don't let your foot point at someone), or about not pointing with your feet (you'd be amazed how often we do that!) or not putting your feet on things (that probably goes for most countries...).  I figured I would remember what I could and just watch when I got here and see how it all played out. 

Some of the things I read seem abundantly true but others I can't quite interpret yet.  For example, if the whole foot thing is such a big deal, why do my students routinely remove their shoes in class and sit on their feet?  This is something I would never allow in an American classroom- you just don't take your shoes off in public- but here it seems kind of natural and comfortable and no one seems to mind, so I let it go.  I've got a Thai student who leans forward on his desk, knees on the chair with his feet sticking out in the air behind him- the soles of his feet very much showing and pointing at whomever walks by.  And sometimes I see Thais sit cross legged on a chair or something like that which would seem taboo to me based on what I read. 

All of this perplexes me because I like sitting on my feet.  I like sitting cross legged or with my knees drawn up and my feet on the chair or couch in front of me.  So if that kind of thing is okay, I'm going to do it.  If it's not, I really don't want to offend anyone.  And granted, though they may be scandalized if they knew, no one is in my apartment to care that my coffee table often serves as both a foot rest and a dining table. 

It's taking me a while to get all the foot rules down.  My first week here I pointed at something (that was on the floor) with my foot.  Luckily, no one really saw but my friend, who though a new teacher had lived in Thailand before, and she ever so discreetly and kindly reminded me I shouldn't do that.  I've "messed up" other times with my feet.  Sometimes it's quick and no one says anything but I notice half way through and think oh crap! I pointed with my foot again! Other times it has been pointed out a bit publicly to me, not meanly, but publicly, and I get really embarrassed.  I know it is yet another thing that will take time, take mental training to remember all the time, but it is definitely confounded by the fact that I'm still a little fuzzy on all the details. 

I feel like there's a lot to learn about shoes too, since they go with the feet.  I went shoe shopping on Monday and was getting ready to try on the first pair, and suddenly thought, oh no! what if there are special unwritten rules about trying on shoes, seeing as I'm going to put my feet in them! I was definitely glad I had the vocabulary to at least ask if I could try them on before doing so!  Then today I saw a Thai holding a pair of shoes for a bit.  They put them back in the bag and said, "Now I need to go wash my hands."  Makes sense, with the foot bit, but it never would have occurred to me! 

Luckily, I have a few good friends who are my 'culture and etiquette guides'. I asked one of them at lunch last weekend a whole bunch of questions about feet, and another one about different wedding protocol today.  You need those people in a foreign country. In Argentina Vale was my 'go-to' person. Whenever I needed a cultural interpretation, or wasn't sure how to dress or what to expect at an event, I could ask her and she wouldn't be offended by my weird questions and not knowing. 

Sooner or later, I'll at least master these basic aspects of the culture here, the surface level ones that people can see.  Now for those hidden cultural things, I'm going to need a few more decades :)