safety stuff

I met with Landes today, the guy in charge of international security at BYU, and we talked about some of the safety precautions I need to take while in Uganda this spring/summer.

1. Never be outside anywhere after dark, well as much as I can control. So when I'm traveling to and from Kampala and Gulu, I need to make sure to calculate how much time it will take and plan to only be traveling during daylight hours.

2. Don't ride the motorcycles. Uganda has one of the highest rates of vehicle accidents in the world because the driving is really chaotic and the "roads" aren't paved or kept up.

3. Check out the bus/taxi/whatever mode of transportation before getting inside. Landes said that I should walk all around the vehicle to make sure that there aren't any flat tires and if there are, I should tell the driver they need to get it fixed before I'll get in the vehicle. He said to even check how much gas is in the vehicle and if it's not enough to get to the destination, say something and maybe even offer to pay for gas. Often the drivers won't have enough money to drive and then they risk it and run out of gas or barely make it and wait until you pay them to put gas in the vehicle.

4. Don't be embarrassed to be different when it comes to safety. He said that even if no one else is doing it, I should put the seat belt on in the taxi. I should just be smart about different small safety things like that that maybe most people don't take notice of or follow.

5. Be prepared. Before getting on the bus to go to Kampala or something like that, I should pack an extra water bottle and some snacks because you never know how long the ride will end up being. A 5 hour drive may end up being 24 hours if the bus gets a flat tire or you run out of gas or something like that. You may end up being stuck somewhere in the middle of nowhere for who knows how long.

the unavoidable culture shock

The reading for class today was about culture shock and how you're pretty much guaranteed to experience culture shock to at least some degree while in a foreign country. A few different things stuck out to me.

First of all, I need to understand that I will most likely experience culture shock, so I need to prepare myself for it and while going through culture shock, I need to be patient with myself. I know that I'm the kind of person that likes to think that I will thrive in a new country and will just be so excited and happy to be there, but I need to understand that I won't feel like that the whole time I'm in Uganda and that's okay. And then I need to follow through by actually doing all that I can to learn about the culture before going, having an open-mind, understanding my own culture and the other things that I can do before going to Uganda that will help decrease the negative impact of culture shock on myself while there.

Anther thing that I am very glad the author addressed, was what he called "reentry shock". This is referring to the adjustment when coming back home from being abroad. I have a feeling that this might end up being a bigger issue for me than culture shock while over in Uganda. My mom was only in Uganda for two weeks and she experienced pretty extreme reentry shock when she came home. She felt constantly guilty for all that she has and upset with the materialism in the United States, especially when she noticed it among Mormons. She felt overwhelmed with this responsibility she felt from having been given so much and then she was so overwhelmed, she had a period when she wanted to just not even try or do anything. She got over it eventually and slowly adjusted back to life in the US, acknowledging the impact that her experience had on her and her change in mindset. After hearing my mom tell me about this experience, I felt like I might very well experience something similar, but I'm grateful that I have people in my life who have been through similar experiences to what I will go through, that will be able to help me out.

The last piece of advice that the article gave regarding how to decrease culture shock, is to keep the faith. I think this is my favorite piece of advice because I feel like that applies in so many ways. I need to have faith in myself that I will be able to overcome any struggles I have while dealing with culture shock, or any other bumps in the road, in Uganda. I need to have faith that I am in the right place while over there and not second guess my ability to learn and thrive in a new country. I also need to have faith in the people I meet in Uganda and believe that they are good people who aren't out to get me or make fun of me. I really like the quote from the article that says, "If you genuinely communicate that you are the student (interested in learning about their culture) and they are the teachers, very few people in the world would refuse to share their expertise."