Repost from @omf_int - Lots of people have heard about culture shock. Its that feeling of disorientation, confusion, or frustration when you are suddenly surrounded by a foreign culture and a foreign language, and are not sure which way is up. You don’t know what people are saying, where to find the basic necessities of life, or how to do things that a child would know in your home country. Its the funky smells, the weird dress, and baffling behaviors. But the nice thing about culture shock is that you get over it. It may takes a few days, weeks, or months, but it does pass. All those bizarre things don’t seem so bizarre anymore. In fact, some of them seem down right normal and expected. Some of them you really come to enjoy. Those high levels of stress that you experienced at first are way lower now… usually. And it is that “usually” that I want to talk about in this post. New missionaries and other foreigners in a new culture may eventually get past the culture shock phase of their life overseas, there is something that you never get over, at least not completely. That’s culture stress. it is caused by those aspects of culture that are familiar and known, but are still frustrating and annoying, perhaps infuriating. Even after a missionary gets a grasp on the language and is familiar with many of the ins and outs of their host culture, there are still things that don’t sit well with them and induce a type of low level stress that would not be present in their home country. Culture stress can come from lots of different sources. It could be the mere fact of looking different than everyone in the culture around you, and being seen as a curiosity or a source of money before you are seen as a person. It could be the fact you are openly and blatantly charged twice the price at certain locations simply because you look like a foreigner. The next time you pray for missionaries, or for any Christian living cross-culturally, pray that God would help them to deal with the cultural stress that they experience on a regular basis. Karl & Sun Dahlfred #TheTaskUnfinished #willyoupray #crossculturalliving #missionarylife https://www.instagram.com/p/BpNoBZZH1Bl/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=5imlbbkc8sf8