Remember that wave of homesickness that hit you a few days upon arrival to a new country? No cozy bedroom, no BFF’s to drink coffee with, no Mommy to serve dinner, no green smoothie from the organic cafe down the street, no more weekly soccer practices, no more commercials you actually understand. Seemed like the worst thing in the world, to be removed from all that is familiar and to be thrown into a sea of strangeness, into dunes of discomfort- right?
Time to unpack! Then let the real work begin.
Wrong. After a gap year full of adventures and laughter, coming home after traveling abroad tastes pretty similar, but even worse. Suddenly, you are missing new friends and routines from abroad, while at the same time questioning everything about the good ol’ life at home. What happened? What’s wrong? Is this normal? What changed?
You, dear globe-trotting citizen, changed. Here’s our take on what to do after your gap year to help you make sense of it all.
Why you might experience reverse culture shock after your gap year
More accurately, you spent a gap year abroad developing new skills, participating in new cultures, meeting new people, seeing foreign horizons, and generally having your world turned upside down, while back home, everything seems the same. Maybe your friend got a couple more tattoos and your neighbor’s hedges grew a bit taller, but, ultimately, everything is exactly how you left it. And it makes perfect sense that the New and Evolved You is having a hard time fitting back into the little shell you left behind and figuring out what to do after your gap year.
Coming home from abroad ain’t easy. Reverse culture shock is seeing your old life as an outsider, much like you saw new lands as a stranger abroad. Maybe you are criticizing rules from your home country, you feel like an alien among your old group of friends, or you can’t believe how narrow-minded people are. Also: you’re not the exotic foreigner anymore. That’s a lot of diminuendo to cope with!
Give yourself time to process the experience. Reverse culture shock can be a formidable opponent!
8 ideas to reintegrate after your gap year abroad
But, fear not. Gap year is done, but the journey is not over yet. In fact, it’s just beginning! Use these tips to reintegrate when coming home after traveling abroad and to keep living an inspired life after a gap year:
1. Stay inspired
Instead of falling into the bog of boredom, keep your positive travel energy up by surrounding yourself with all the good things of life when coming home from abroad: playlists of sappy Italian ballads, warm pains au chocolat for breakfast, good bottles of malbec, internet streaming of Mexican drama series, or whatever it is that you loved most abroad. Even better: spread this positivity by creating a travel blog, in which you can not only unleash all of your love for That Country, but also inspire others to check it out themselves!
2. Get a cool job
Probably, you stumbled upon some new passion abroad that now you can’t imagine living life without. Great! Keep whatever made you smile in your daily routine by getting a job in a related field. For example- fell in love with the rows of tulips in Holland? Work in a flower shop. Craving REAL cappuccini (no, it’s not cappuccinos, grazie very much)? Use your coffee knowledge at a café. Missing those Argentine criollos like crazy? Help out at a farm.
3. Expand your circle of friends
Definitely keep in touch with all of those cool peeps met abroad (free couches all over the world are always a good thing), but don’t ditch old friend as a consequence. After all, they stuck with you through that awkward teenage phase, so they deserve it. Furthermore, make even new friends in your home country that have some sort of connection to your gap year experience. There are always cultural circles, activities, or associations that can surround you with the mentalities and languages from abroad- but in your own backyard.
Find meetup groups or other events for like-minded people (#travelers) to grow your network of friends.
4. Be interested
Things might seem the same, but a lot probably happened while you were gone. Don’t discard the fact that time exists equally in all parts of the world. One method to make reintegrating after a gap year easier is to ask questions and be interested in the lives of family and friends; even small changes can have a big significance and impact. Plus, it’s good manners to show interest in others, especially since you are probably ranting nonstop about your own transatlantic adventures. Speaking of…
5. Limit yourself to two “When I was in…” stories per party.
It seems that every occurrence or comment- no matter how unrelated- opens up a flood of memories from Abroad. Naturally, you want to share these with the entire world, always, as animatedly as possible. And while it is healthy to tell your stories, hogging every conversation with wishful reminiscing or a nostalgic odyssey is not to the benefit of anyone. Use the gap year experience to expand mentalities back home and to inspire others to tread forth for themselves, but don’t just gush about How Great Life Is In That Country, especially in a way that belittles life at home. There are pro’s and con’s to every place.
6. Educate others
When it seems that no one is actually interested in listening to your gap year experience (translation: they doze off after three hours, when you haven’t even finished talking about the first week), change your strategy. Instead of talking, why not cook a dish from abroad to show others new flavours from foreign lands? Change your audience, too. Seek out fellow students that participated in abroad studies; they can probably relate a lot more to your joys and frustrations than someone who never left the state. Among similar lines, take all of your boundless information and direct it toward someone who truly cares: prospective gap year participants. Write a review for your program; there are many dying to know the most minutes details of the experience (yes, really!).
Find forums, review websites like GoAbroad, or other areas to share your wisdom as a gap year program alumni.
7. Keep challenging yourself
Abroad, every day was an adventure in itself: new languages, new friends, new routines, weird spices. Back home, daily life might seem boring in comparison. But, it’s up to you to add a dash of excitement! Keep studying your new language, join a class to keep up your new hobbies, or introduce your family and closest friends to a favourite routine from abroad.
8. Keep traveling
Now that you have been bitten by the travel bug, follow through on temptation. Having learned that travel is a lot easier, cheaper, and more fun than you thought, it should be second nature to take long weekend trips away, or even just to explore new local neighborhoods (funny how you now know Amsterdam better than your own town, huh?). Travel is just as much a mindset as it is physical movement, so see your hometown with new eyes and appreciate all the small things you were so awed by abroad.
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The easy part is done. Who will you become?
The thought of a gap year abroad used to seem like the most difficult and scary thing on the planet, but now you realize that the experience away was actually the easy part: take what you learned and use it to become a more complete person and to change the world around you in a positive manner. Not everyone has the advantage of experiencing different cultures; maintain your open mindset and use that awareness to become a global ambassador on a daily basis. It’s good for everyone: for others, to learn new things, and for yourself, to practice patience and gain a higher understanding of the world at large.
Meet the most badass version of yourself. S/he’s in there!
Now that the gap year abroad has come to a close and you are an inspired story-teller back home, make the most of your challenges and discomforts to extend the experience. Home might not be the idealized bubble you remembered it as from the other side of the ocean, but, in the end, it is much like any place on earth: charming imperfection. Exploit its characteristics, focus on new professional and personal goals developed abroad, add sparkles to your post-gap resume, and maintain new habits to make re-entry as smooth as possible. Give a grateful smile for the experience, re-center, be a momma duck to current gap year-ers in your own town, write a program review to inspire others, and don`t lose the sense of wonder gained abroad while figuring out what to do after your gap year.
Reintegrating after a gap year abroad is not simple, but it is just another stage of the travel saga. As proven on a daily basis abroad, the greatest journey is within yourself, so make peace with defining “home” as a mentality, not a place on the map. Then, “home, sweet, home” is possible everywhere!
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