Missing India, Reverse Culture Shock and a Little Bit of Seasonal Blues

When I returned to Europe in 2009 from a trip that lasted more than three years and included lots of travel around India, studying yoga in Mysore and long trips to nearby countries including Thailand, Singapore and Nepal, I was more than ready to leave Asia. Europe was, in my mind, a paradise where everything is clean and efficient and functions perfectly. Europe was the dreamland with no
The Belur Temple in Karnataka South India

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cheating rickshaw drivers and no bureaucracy that has been created to extract bribes from foreigners by driving us so mad that we’d be happy to pay anything just so we would not have to fill in another inexplicable piece of paper. Europe was a place that had decent bread (and that means bread that is baked in an oven and is not flat), non-spicy food, cheese that actually tastes like cheese. My Dream Europe had cold crispy winter mornings and people who would get things done in three working days without asking for a “present”.

The disappointment was so great that I am still not sure if I am going through a reverse culture shock that has lasted over two years, or if my mind had simply created an illusion of Europe that never existed in reality.