Category Archives: UK Life 英国生活

我的生活在英国　My life Back in the UK

Coughs and Colds

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I write this sitting in the office during my lunch break, unusually the sun is shining outside and the office is pretty much empty. The pic below shoes what I see in the evenings out of the window, It’s something I still can’t quite get used to.

Things have died down, though annoyingly I am still busy with lots of things going on. Over the last few months the atmosphere at my work has changed, the CEO has announced a pay freeze (on everyones pay except his, some thing never change!) and I am certain that more people will lose their jobs next year (despite what the business says to the contrary).

I guess you have to be positive, so in a perverted way, it gives an ideal opportunity for business to offload the dead wood, those that come to work do very little (apart from watch BBC sport online) and blame the job cuts it on the economy.

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It’s that time of the year when people start to get colds and coughs and the perennial ‘flu bug’ goes round. What I’ve noticed over the last few weeks is that there is this mentality (certainly where I work anyway) where people will come to work anyway if they are not feeling well, in the hope that it will go away and they will grin and bear it.

You can’t question the work-ethic of such thinking, but for me it’s very short-sited, selfish and ultimately stupid.

I am very lucky in that I seldom get Ill, but I can’t help feeling annoyed by people that come to work with horrible coughs and colds exposing their germs and bacteria to everyone they get near to. It is selfish and stupid. So of course, those that are not sick soon become Ill and the cycle continues to the point where, last week, so many people were actually off work sick, normal operation of the business suffered.

So many people here can choose to work from home if they are not feeling great, but still feel up to working-they don’t even have to come into the office – So why is is that so many people come to work sick or coughing their guts up and spreading their diseases, when they should be at home?

Mis education –

People think it will go away (which to be fair, it will do eventually) they can grin and bear it. Macho attitude – weak to admit you are sick.!

Don’t understand/don’t care just how easy it is for you to pass a cold on to another person (i.e handshake)

Attitude and social values –

Some people think its bad to be Ill and will pretend they are ok. Don’t know why this is, may be a certain stigma is attached to people who can’t work, on benefits etc…

Importance –

Some will go to work as there is something they must attend/do.

Even if they are suffering from the plague they must attend.

It’s interesting contrasting this with China.  Despite it being generally dirtier in Chinese cities and less hygienic for sure, many in the west would think the Chinese are hypochondriacs and overreact to illnesses.

There are some nasty bugs in China that you don’t get in the UK, but the obvious reason for this kind of hypochondria (beyond the fact that nobody really wants to be sick) is lack of employment rights (i.e no sick pay/statutory benefits are almost non existent) and health care costing money.

You get sick, you pay.

I don’t get it, it’s one of the (very few) advantages of the social system that exists in the UK whereby you are legally entitled to not have to go into work if you are unwell. You even GET PAID (unless you work for yourself), If you get really Ill, you continue to get paid in some cases for 6 months or more. You even get free health care, ok you have to pay for a prescription, but access to see a doctor does not cost you a penny!

<rant>

I also think there is a way of doing things that has grown out of personal car ownership whereby people seldom wear warm clothes that were once worn in the UK; thermals, long coats, thick jumpers are a thing of the past. People get out of their warm cars and don’t spend long amounts of time outside like they used to – I think this is a contributor to sickness and Illness as it makes people more susceptible to illness, but I’m not doctor this is just a thought…

</rant>

Maybe I am cynical in my attitude, but I think that I am almost entitled to my days off work from sickness. If I feel unwell, I wont go to work. In the UK don’t feel I have to justify this to anybody, after all I pay more than my fair share of taxation that supports this very social system :soldier: !!!  I’m not talking about abusing the system i.e. being ‘sick’ and claiming benefits from the government, rather than working. It’s more a case of making the most of what you pay for and not spreading your illness to others in the office.

In China when I was sick I would not get paid or would have to make up the hours missed. However, I paid very little tax, so when I was Ill I knew that I would have to pay from my own pocket. This is a harsher system and detrimentally affects those that are more susceptible to illness like the Old and the very young , but from a purely selfish perspective it’s better for me in my current situation!

Pros and Cons

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Having worked in an office environment for almost a year, I have come to fully appreciate how much better your quality of life can be working in different environments each day.  Not just stuck indoors, at a desk, looking at a screen most of the day.  Being around  different people and having the freedom to choose how you approach your daily life does have its advantages.

I guess I am in a better position now to reflect upon these things, I guess strangely what’s best about this is that having the experience gives you the chance to put  things into a perspective that others don’t have; helps you see things in another light.

I spent almost 3 years teaching English in China full or part time and it was one of the most interesting and rewarding things I’ve ever done. At times it was tough, frustrating and difficult, but overall I still beleive it’s a positive thing to do if you ever get the chance.

Saying this,  teaching is an incredibly tiring thing to do. It is not like a desk-job – you have to constantly be on the ball and the amount of speaking/exertion of energy is quite high, which can really drain you.

I would say that it is more tiring than the 7am-7pm day I  have at the moment, even with all the commuting.

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The Gym

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I walk to work everyday through central London, I enjoy this. Not only is it an interesting place to walk through, it helps keep me healthy and saves money. 🙂  An absolute no brainer you would think.

When I tell people at work that I do this many people think I am mad. It’s only 2 miles each way, I get to walk along the thames, past st pauls and along some really interesting side streets. There is no excuse for not doing this in the summer as the weather here is not humid and the sun not very strong.

The underground transport system in London is pretty unpleasant at the best of times (more like a sewer for people) and during the rush-hour cannot cope with the amount of people who use it. It’s also expensive and dirty and prone to delays – so why do people who travel short distances still use it??

I guess its more out of routine, following the crowd – doing what they’ve alway done.  It’s a mindset, a psychology of indifference- I hope I never end up being like this. :dazed:

Looking Back

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Things are so incredibly busy, but  its it’s a good busy.  Infact, I like to be busy, it makes certainly makes time appear to go faster. I still feel I’m quite lucky I still have it in my head that that starting work at 9am is late! 😀 – I am used to starting 8am during the week.  

Looking back I would say that (smug grin 🙂 ) I think was right in coming back when I did.  There is no doubt whatsoever that staying in Changchun longer would mean that getting into any type of decent profession back in the UK would have been almost impossible.  It is very competitive here, and being 25 was almost too late to enter the job market into something that I wanted to do.   Life is not so interesting here, things are more predictable and boring but perhaps that is a good  thing for a while. (?) 

 I am not that motivated by careers (which is partly why I stayed out there so long) but life is long and sometimes doing something that you don’t like for a while in order to get to a better position in  a couple of years time, makes sense to me.   Changchun is not a good place to get ahead (I will also argue that for a young foreigner like me, China also) after all – why not get trained/experience in the west when in China the prospects (for me at the moment) are considerably less. 

I also feel that in somewhere like London there is a chance to get ahead in life, to develop.  In Changchun (and China to an extent) this does not exist – unless you have serious guanxi or family ties or sleep with the boss etc…   

 I also believe (perhaps naively) that where I am now I can get places through hard-work, determination and going that extra-mile. 

In China I did not feel this at all (It is not really a place where your work goes rewarded). 

 I believe that in work at least it is possible to progress for actually being good at what you do – even if you have no connections.   Of course these help, don’t get me wrong, but there are other ways – In China there are very, very few indeed.  Making relationships, influencing friends is crucial. 

Strangely It is harder in other ways to get started in the UK, life is more expensive especially the important things such as food and petrol! 

 But people neglect to think that SO many other things are very cheap in the UK (relatively speaking) – entertainment, junk food, cars, electronics, cosmetics  and many many other luxury goods.   

I also think that many people here are spoilt and decedent (and the lifestyle to an extent is perpetuated by the whole tax/class system)  beyond belief and really need a reality check – seeing how people who have nothing live their lives.  Indeed  people here have forgotten many of the values that I find quite important  – and witnessed in China – such as being able to repair things, and not just throwing  away things for no reason.   

Life goes on 

 

     

 

   

 

Office View

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view from my offcce

I can’t really complain about having a view like this from my desk, certainly makes a difference working in this kind of environment.  Makes you realise just how much better it is to work in the UK, there are so many more opportunities for someone in my position that simply don’t exist in China at the moment.    悲伤

The working environment is so much better and balanced in favour of the employee,  you’re not just a work-machine.   People are treated as human beings and employers have rights and obligations they have to observe – which in some part help stop exploitation by business on employees.  And so (where I work anyway) generally,  people are more inclined to work harder and respect what they are actually doing as a job; paying attention to detail.  Something which I noticed (in the private sector more-so) in China was lacking if only because the work-conditions are often so poor, prospects limited or non existent and salary so low. 

In my job, sometimes it can be boring, but i seldom feel as if i am wasting my time – I don’t feel as if I should spend my time playing QQ games because nobody would notice or care about what I’m doing.  Because I am treated well, I will have no problem working hard.  大笑

I think it is rather sad that Western companies in China do not treat their employees as they do in the west.  I know that is part of the attraction of having offices in China (low fixed-costs, hire and fire easily, massive pool of cheap labour) but wouldn’t it make more long-term business sense to treat their employees in a similar fashion to their western colleagues?  

I mean, think of all of the intelligent, hard-working Chinese who when have the opportunity to leave China – simply go – a brain drain of the best and brightest because the work conditions are so much better elsewhere.

Afterall, if you have the choice of working for a multinational firm outside of China on a foreign contract, why would you want to work on a Chinese contract inside china doing exactly the same job for the same company?? 正在思考

For all the bad things about living in the UK, it is a good place to learn, gain work experience and make connections.  As much as I’d like to live elsewhere, at this moment, London is probably the best place to be in order to allow me to move on in a year or two

Olympics

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Been working hard. Time has been going so fast recently, have got into the 9-5 routine which isn’t great, but the work is good at least.

Still find myself taking pictures of London walking to work, at lunch and coming home even though I Spend most of my time in an office looking out over the Thames.

 

Kind of feel a bit like a tourist at times, anyway…

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  Wrote this rant a couple of weeks ago in response to some of the stuff been shown on TV and in cyberspace –

What a total joke the torch relay is.

I was in London as the torch procession went through, and I was appalled at how big a police operation was needed just to let 1 person carry a rather small torch through a stupidly long route of 31 miles around London.

Politics aside, whoever made the go-ahead for this torch-relay through London should be out of a job.

It apparently cost the UK taxpayer 1 million pounds (1400wan) just for the policing operation – money which I pay was spent on this is a total disgrace.

Perhaps the bill could be sent to the organising committee of the Beijing Games – why should my tax go into such an event???

The government here is so afraid of upsetting the Chinese government viz-a-viz the Olympics simply because the 2012 Olympics is here in London. They realise that any action taken by them that is seen to be negative by the Chinese, will probably result in tit-for-tat reprisals in 4 years time. How pathetic. It’s only a sporting event – if anything else caused so much fuss and budget overun they would cancel the event, but because it’s the Olympics every rational thought is removed from the equation.

Personally I don’t care what anybody ‘thinks’- it’s a simple question of wasting taxpayers money on an un-necessary and pointless event.

 I have the feeling that this is the tip of the iceberg and that this is just the beginning of billions of pound of taxpayers money being thrown into the Olympic black-hole. No-body really actually know the full price of hosting such an event, or whether it is finanically a goer – the only certainty is that those that run the Olympic movement -the IOC (an unaccountable bribe-taking group of degenerates) – are lining their own pockets.

I don’t believe why many people that say sport and politics are separate – who are they kidding?

I can only think they must be incredibly naive/bordering moronic. When you have people representing their respective countries in an international event then the two will inevitably overlap.

Personally I don’t actually understand why there is a torch relay anyway? Apparently It’s a tradition started by Hitler and the Nazis in the wartime Olympics- so why is it still continued??

I think the answer is that the people behind the Olympics – the very powerful and corrupt IOC – think that the greater the publicity and build-up to the event, the more money can be made though endorsements and merchandise and the like. It’s all about corporate business being able to associate their name with the globally recognised olympic brand and make more money through exploiting this.

 

At the torch relay in London there were Beijing Olympic flags being given out and these long blow-up tube things that are used to make loud noises when hit together. On the reverse side of the flags wasn’t the Olympic logo, or even the Chinese flag but a large black image saying – SAMSUNG…

For those particularly nationalistic Chinese that think the Olympics is about China’s coming of age from it’s ‘peaceful rise’ – my opinion is that is only a footnote.

It’s more about western big business having a platform to advertise to a massive -as-of-yet, un-tapped market. To publicise and market it’s brands to the 1.6 billion Chinese that present a massive business opportunity in the next few years. To put this into perspective – there are about 300 million people in the US and about 500 million in the whole EU – the potential in China is massive.

I believe It’s also about those powerful people that run China doing deals and making lots and lots of money on the back of the Olympic brand. The whole nationalistic idea is a smokescreen for the true purpose of the games. Oh yes and there is a sporting event too.

I am not anti-China, It is great that somewhere like China has the chance to host such an event that It has never had the chance to host before.

If people in 4 years criticised the British government about some human rights abuses and there were protests at the London games, I can bet you that British people would not necessarily see it as a slur on their country and national identity as the Chinese have.

Here the government is separate from the identity of the country; in China it is not. To a huge extent, the communist party is China – you say something bas about the Communists then you are a threat to China.

It’s interesting reading some of the stuff you see in the UK Press about China – it almost all has negative connotations. Very few positive stories make the cut. Is this because there is are no good things to report in China? – of course not, but those are usually not so interesting stories for the viewers- plus news shown on TV here is usually negative by nature.   Just watching the BBC the other day the lead story was that ‘China is now the World’s biggest polluter’.

The coverage was ever so melodramatic, as if a milestone has been passed and that the end of the world is near and through implication China is now to blame for the most of it.   Yes the Chinese are big polluters, but the west has been doing it for more than half a century. 

For me this story was re-hashed old news and I don’t see how it could be justified as the top story on the evening news – so its no wonder when you talk to a westerner about China the first words they say are words like pollution, power-stations or human rights.

I think that people generally believe what they are fed on the news or at least subconsciously absorb the information without thinking about it. Just as the people in China are fed a news-diet of censored government propaganda, in the UK the news organisations also have their own agendas. The problem is that if a story has a potential to be sensationalised and people can relate to it through images, then it sells more papers, gets more viewers. And that’s what the bottom line is.

I’ve read lots of Chinese news sites showing articles with Chinese people getting annoyed about what’s been shown on CNN, the way it’s been sensationalised and some of the particularly dull commentary made by it’s journalists. I think Chinese people have to realise that CNN is simply sensationalising the story in order to capture more viewers/ appeal to their viewership (ie. lowest common denominator /not very thinking people ((mostly Americans in this case)) ) – something that American news channels do as a matter of course.

This is nothing new.

Just as the Chinese press is far from impartial so is the UK press – the difference is that when bad things are said about the UK by the Chinese press, people in the UK really don’t care;

People even show their nationalism throughMSN Whereas in China people are much more nationalistic and proud and therefore more sensitive to criticism (right or wrong) of the state and see it as an affront to the dignity of Chinese people. In the west we are used to hearing bad things said all the time about our country, In China you are you not.

This is in-part due to people in mainland China only ever reading and viewing what the government wants them to read/see i.e never any bad news about the Communist party – unless it’s scapegoating an individual as a means to show how the party is weeding out those so called bad apples!

There is also a slightly sinister side to this I think; when the political might of the Communist party gets behind the whole ‘China’ issue and propagates it’s view of the situation to the people.  The Chinese are very fast to jump on the bandwagon – and I would have to say If the object of their derision is non-Chinese (i.e foreigners) It is very easy to whip-up those people into nationalistic frenzy.

I witnessed this kind of reactionary behaviour during the Japanese textbook row erupted a couple of years ago. Many Chinese were incensed and threatened boycotts of Japanese goods and all sorts of other punitive actions-  But what actually happened was nothing. When it came to the crunch people were not willing to fore-go their JVCs and Toyotas.

The whole Tibet argument is not something new, it has been around for decades. Everybody in the west knows about China and it’s human-rights recordm- this is also old news.

My opinion is that this is not as clear-cut as many of the protesters like to make out, bad things go on in all countries – just they are better at keeping it secret in the west.  In my opinion  western governments have very little moral high ground, if any at all to lecture the Chinese.

It is only now that the stuff in the Chinese media has started to show less towards foreigners and more direction it at the ‘dalai clique’ (who incidentally don’t even want independence for Tibet, simply the ability to run their own affairs within a region of China like Hong Kong) – even the communists know that it’s western business that makes the Olympics what it is, and for all it’s rhetoric, Beijing wants a smooth Olympics at all costs.

There is a problem that I think the Chinese authorities have with the Olympics – for all the great economic and social achievement over the last 20 years, China is still miles behind when it comes to liberty, the rule of law, freedom of speech and ultimately, human rights. In a sense it has developed socially and economically but not politically – within China this poses no real problem but to some in the West this poses serious issues.

The huge irony in seeing so many pro-china protesters (mostly rich Chinese students) on the streets of London the other day, is that in this country (for now at least!) you are allowed to protest, to show your opinion peacefully – even if the government does not agree with it.  In China you cannot.

6 months on… 半年后

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Been back in the UK for 6 months.  😯

It’s been an interesting experience, some things have sometimes not gone as planned and It has been tougher than I expected. Now things are starting to get better, though I still miss my life in China.

There are many frustrating things about moving back to your home country that you don’t consider until you’re actually back here. Thins which you don’t consider before leaving. I knew the transition would be quite difficult, I had planned for it to be tough, but still there are many things about life here that is just so infuriating.

Over the past few weeks I’ve written some of the more frustrating things I’ve come across in trying to reintegrate back into UK life.

What I’ve noticed is that you start get used to things after a while, but that necessarily doesn’t mean that you like those alll of those thongs. For me the biggest advantage (or disadvantage perhaps 😕 ) of being outside the country for a while, is that I now think about many things about my life in the UK that previously I never even gave a second glance to. It’s certainly made me more critical of things and as a result of this sadly I’m getting more and more cynical.

I think there are many things to worry about living here that I never had in China.

It isn’t all to do with money but the incredibly high cost of living is a major factor- but there are other wider issues that concern me about living in the UK.

I think you basically have to realise that there really are no systems in place for British nationals coming back after living abroad for a while. It’s as if you are being punished for daring to leave the motherland! 😈

Many people are supported in various ways in the UK, actually pretty much everyone except you – because you don’t exist – and even if you did you can’t be trusted until you’ve been resident in the UK – but of course you still pay tax – Children, Old people, not-so-old-people, sick people, disabled people, certain ethnic groups, single parents, married couples, unmarried couples, gay partners, transsexuals, fat people and prisoners, the list goes on…

I wouldn’t be complaining if I paid little tax and could opt out fromt the system, but I can’t.

My views about taxation have changed considerably since living in China. I agree that people should pay tax, what I disagree with is paying such a high rate of tax on everything; inproping up an overblown controlling state apparatus, in effect supporting the system I disagree with.

As someone that has come back to the ‘motherland’ (I’m searching for a noun for this) You do not exist.

You are a non-person.

You may think (as I did) So what? What difference does that make anyway? Well, from my experience, it can make things really hard because if you have not been in the country, basically, you are not on any of the big-brother computer systems that dictate whether or not we can do something.

Because I have been out of the country for 3 years, OBVIOUSLY, I have had no UK addresses since then. This is not a difficult concept to grasp. But to the authorities you surely have something to hide, nobody leaves the UK to live abroad, right? To the government you are lower than a person that has just come out of prison, at least in their eyes they knew where they were and what they were doing!

The thing is, I can actually prove where I have been, I have various rental contracts and contracts of employment that show this, passport stamps, visas – but this is of no use to anyone in the UK.

To the UK government if you go to live in a place like China you might as well have gone to live on the moon.

For me this is exacerbated because I left here straight after university, meaning I have no investments in the UK i.e property; had not paid into the tax system, – I had nothing to link myself with here.

Here are some other issues I’ve encountered from not being in the UK:

Not eligible for many jobs. Can’t pass basic security clearance (and so many jobs unnecessarily require this) – criminal records checks. Can’t pass credit reference checks ( and so many jobs unnecessarily require this too!!!) Ineligible for many government jobs (probably a good thing 😉 ).

I just think it’s all gone too far. It’s beyond a joke – westerners may complain about many Chinese not being able to think for themselves, not being able to join-the-dots – but here people have seemingly have lost the ability to use common sense. People are constantly looking over their shoulders, worried about breaking some rule or regulation, frightened about saying something that may offend despite it being the right thing to do… Anyway

Can’t open Bank accounts as – No UK utility bills, not on the electoral roll (even though I have the right to vote, UK nationals can’t vote at UK embassies- must have UK address) no UK tax receipts, no rental agreements, mortgage statements, etc etc etc…..

Basically nothing that I can use to prove where I have been living for the last few years that they will accept. So I am an outcast It’s so annoying as there is no flexibility in the system – you are either in or out.

I feel as if every single corner of your life is tightly controlled by the government, but of course this only affects the law abiding people. It’s normal people who suffer, and so I my eyes you are effectively punished for being law abiding. This is partly why I have come to the conclusion that government and over regulation is the problem, not the solution.

The irony is that the UK is meant to be a capitalist country and China a communist, command economy – but to me it’s almost the opposite. People in the UK think that this is a democratic country, think they have rights, when in reality it is a very shallow democracy and your rights in the UK are being eroded everytime parliamant makes another law. Afterall therei s is no entrenched written constitution in the UK, and all the political leaders have been to the same schools, came from the same backgrounds;- its the same whichever country you live in…

I’m not saying thatthe Chinese government is perfect, far from it. They have some disgusting practices and cause so many people to have hard lives, but my point is that generally speaking for most people living their lives, most of the time the government takes very little interest in your own affairs.

More on Reverse Culture Shock

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I’m getting lazy with upating this, will eventually get around to sorting out the whole website again…

Want to add some of my thoughts on the reverse culture shock thing that happens when you come back to your home country after a while outside. I’m in a weird stage at the moment, past the initial moments but yet to fully assimilate everything.
I found this breakdown of the stages to RCS and have added a few personal thought to them:
STAGE 1: Disengagement

While you are still abroad, you begin to start thinking about moving back home and moving away from your overseas experience and friends.

Yes, very true – especially in the last few weeks/months, start to look forward to getting back home and seeing family/freinds again.

STAGE 2: Euphoria

You may be very excited to be back in your own country and others may be equally delighted to have you back. After people express their pleasure at seeing you again, and listen politely to your stories for a while, you may suddenly and/or painfully realize that they are not particularly interested in what happened to you and would much rather prefer to talk about their own affairs.

Yes true to an extent, though depends on whom you’re talking to. Do notice that most people I know have absolutly no idea what my life was like in China. Really no idea at all. I think It’s very hard for them to imagine what it was like and so perhaps they are more interested in talking about things here in the UK. I know that relating to people is hard, especially if you talk about thing they can’t imagine and they talk about things you don’t know anything of – i.e. anything to do with popluar culture etc!

I just try to keep as busy and occupied as possible, always doing something or other. Whether its work, or visting people or places or just walking somewhere, I find it makes things much easier.

STAGE 3: Alienation

In this stage, you experience dampened euphoria with feelings of alienation, frustration and anger. You may even feel like an outsider – a foreigner in your own country. It will be different from how you remembered it (The pollution may be worse. The pace may be more hurried and hectic, etc.) Suddenly you feel irritated with others and impatient with your own inability to do things as well or as quickly as you hoped. Resentment, loneliness, disorientation and even a sense of helplessness may per vade.

I think I’m in this stage at the moment, I agree things are different from before (It’s not just me 😀 ) and generally I would say they are for the worse. Yes, It’s very easy to get annoyed at other peoples behaviour but for me it’s more of the whole culture of everything that annoys me most – The general way people think and act.
I often see this as myopic and ignorant a general narrow view of life. However, I also see many many positive, great aspects to life here – people are so comfortable, there is no poverty, no food shortages, the police actually do their job, there is much legislation to protect individuals interests, – you can easily live a very comfortable life. So I see why people are like this but on the other hand it really makes me wonder – can I live my life like this?

For most people this is a no-brainer, and the answer is I think is if you live here all your life, in the same area, surrounded by the same influences then you know nothing else. It is comfortable so why risk change!

STAGE 4: Gradual Readjustment

The fourth stage of reentry includes a gradual readjustment to life at home. During this stage, you will no longer be shocked by the variety you find on the supermarket shelves and be able to contain your comments about differences between cultures that come to your attention. If you have difficulty filtering out the foreign words in your conversation, you will find that your English-only conversational skills will improve during stage four.

I’m sure ´Culture Shock´ and ´Reverse Culture Shock´ are real issues and should be considered carefully by anyone who travels overseas for long periods of time. There is no doubt that travelling is an extremely healthy thing to do, it is not only adventurous but we gains insight into our own lives from people and their traditions of Countries we visit. It is also a helpful way to be objective about where we are from, our own lives and a slow process of building more trust in the world as we share more and more of our own native lands with people we historically have deemed to be outsiders.

I’m not at this stage yet, guess it will take more time. I believe there is a part of me that thinks by re-adjusting totally I would be losing things that I have gained from living In China. Also I have this horrible fear that once I’ve ‘readjusted’ I will become like most other people who live here and become stuck in my cocoon, narrow minded, even not wanting to go back to China again. I know many people who, once settled and into this mindset have changed their views on life and have assimilated back into the grind of everyday life. I do not want that to happen to me, but I don’t want to be an outsider. It’s difficult.
I have a theory, I think that perhaps it is not such a good thing to assimilate into everything here, I may live, work,eat, breathe here but I will keep my mind open. However, when you are subjected to living in a culture, you take in thoughts subconsciously- whether this through media or whatever- and I think this has an impact on the way you act/think/do things whether you like it or not!

Differences

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Extremely busy! Gradually adjusting to life here, still is going to take months not weeks -if ever- to get fully back into things!

Also, there really isn’t much to write about, things just aren’t that interesting!

Trying to re-adjust not just to the surroundings, but to the way I’m doing things myself. I have picked up Chinese ways of doing things and here they can sometimes not be so useful!

I’m trying to store away the ‘China’ habits that are not so accepted here, like crossing roads whenever I see a small gap in the traffic, pointing and using lots of body language, using the Chinese hand gestures for numbers (totally useless here), not saying ‘please ‘and ‘thank you’ and ‘sorry’ all the time, standing too close to people in queues, always on my toes to get on the train before anyone else (much to the consternation of others).

And other things mostly related to language and being overly direct, that is, getting straight to the point perhaps sounding like an oaf to others…

Whilst at the same time, trying to keep those many good habits I’ve picked up. Like starting early, saving, cooking, walking, using public transport and wearing clothes for more than 1 day 😉 (Unfortunately others don’t understand this, and would assume I’m ‘dirty’ – so probably best not to do this :D)
There are other small things, take for example, not wearing slippers or sandals every time you enter a home. Just socks feels odd :) , there is definitely something missing! So I now wear sandals in the house despite it being carpeted, out of habit more than anything else!
It’s probably not surprising how being away alters your perception of things, especially things you previously did. There are some things that I previously never even considered or thought about, that I now have opinions on or I think about. I notice things that others do not, especially the more negative aspects to life.
I often find myself asking ‘why do people do things this way?‘ and their response is simply ‘that’s how its always been done!’ Knowing no other way.

I think once you’re used to doing something, you don’t think so much about why- just do it.

I think my being in China has caused me to develop this ‘rose-tinted vision’ of how things are back home, when the reality is, of course, quite different and so I notice things.

When I was in China, even though I lived there for almost 3 years, subconsciously I could always say to myself ‘This is China, if I don’t fully understand why things are like this then – so be it!’ I could accept that things are different. But being in your own country and not liking what you see, this doesn’t apply.

Ok, I’ve only been back 3 weeks or so, but I find the ‘culture’ -for want of a better word- a little backwards! Only now I fully understand the very good aspects to Chinese society that have been long dead in the UK.A good illustration of this is in the prices people pay for goods and services. The UK is so ‘developed’ that you throw things away, because financially speaking it’s not worth fixing. There isn’t the care paid to things, knowing that they can be replaced cheaply. Everything is disposable and short term. China is also short-term, but in other ways – at least there, anything can be fixed.
Take Fruit & veg. Healthy food is more expensive than pre-packed, ready-made junk food.

Indeed People pay a premium to eat ‘good’ food, so you have the bizarre situation where people who cant afford/don’t eat healthy food are fat, or often obese – whereas in China its the opposite of course.

There are so many other situations where I see other things like this, I think that as ‘developed’ the UK is, there are many aspects to life here that are worse than in a place like China. I think most of these issues stem from people having more money, less free time in their lives than they once had, and the commercialisation- instant society- that has developed.

In China I seldom watched the news because who wants to watch one-sided-broadcasting in a foreign language? Here I also don’t watch the news anymore, but for other reasons. It just annoys me listening to other people speak about irrelevant subjects and things in such narrow, insular ways. I also find myself correcting language mistakes (even though my English is also bad! ) – well it used to be my job! 🙂 – the way the English language is changing I won’t be surprised that in say 50 years, dialect will be so thick you’ll need interpreters from one English to the next!