Cultural Shock

My experience with cultural shock:

Costa Rica

What is a cultural shock?

Cultural shock is the feeling of disorientation we have after being exposed to an unfamiliar culture and can no longer take for granted the assumptions about life our culture taught us.

 My experience with another culture:

 I once traveled to Costa Rica, and I was surprised by the gentleness of people, how clean and environmentally friendly the country is, and that the money was of really high value but for buying the cheapest of things you used a lot of them.

My experience with cultural shock in Costa Rica started when we arrived at the border. Me and my family interrupted our journey so we could exchange dollars into colones. But when I got received the colones, I was amazed by the bunch on bills there where. I was pretty confused because in Nicaragua we have bills oof small amounts. I remember that when buying things, I took a lot of time counting and making sure I had not confused the amounts. 

Afterwards, me and my family went to the hotel. Glancing out the window I saw that there was a lot of space just filled with trees. The roads were also very clean and I saw trash very rarely and in small amounts. My trip was at a time where we where going through a political crisis in Nicaragua, and I was very moved of how gently people received us. They were concerned about the situation and asked a lot of questions, they also were very nice and friendly.





          Material Culture: 

• Money: Money has units of high value in Costa Rica

Non-material culture:

• The gentleness and friendliness of people
• The values people have: They place in high importance taking care of the environment

Why was this a cultural shock? Looking at it through ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism is when we measure other cultures according to the standards of our own. Factors in the culture of Costa Rica seem strange to me, because I already had my own conceptions of how things should be done due to my culture.

This was a cultural shock to me because in Nicaragua we have bills of small values that go from 10 cordobas to 1,000 cordobas. But in Costa Rica, it was really confusing to deal with bills that reach as high as 50,000 colones. It made hard for me to distinguish what was expensive from what had a fair price.



In Nicaragua, people are also friendly, but people in Costa Rica go to the next level. They are warmer towards other people and are interested in learning about you and help you.



In Nicaragua, there is a lot of trash on the streets and people don't care about the environment and throw the trash wherever they want. That is why I was surprised by how much care people in Costa Rica have of the environment.

Nicaragua

Costa Rica