15 Feb Blog Challenge Responses Round-Up #12

We have officially come to the end of our first Blog Challenge here at Blogging Abroad. We ended up with 147 bloggers enrolled who each had varying degrees of participation in the Challenge. Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and it has truly been a joy to learn about everyone’s experiences through coordination of this project.

Phase Two of the Blog Challenge: Join the fun!

Feedback from our bloggers has been overwhelmingly positive and constructive, so we’ve decided to extend the opportunity to participate in our Challenge by creating a start-anytime version. By signing up for the Blog Challenge now, you’ll get a weekly e-mail with a prompt. Then you can share your blog responses in the comment section of these Round Up posts so more people will see them. If you’re interested in participating, sign up via our Blog Challenge page to get started.

The Prompt

Challenge #12 = New Normal
What did you never expect to be doing before you arrived in your host country? How have you adapted your routine or social behaviors to the culture around you?

Highlights

• This blogger in Moldova shared a lovely poem about slowing down
• Gabriela in Madagascar lists the 8 signs you are well-integrated in her community
• Ellery in Ethiopia does a nice job of sharing a photo and explanation for each “new normal” in her life abroad

There are so many other great cultural adaptation accomplishments in these blog posts! We encourage you to check out the links below and on our Boot Camp Blog Challenge pinterest board.

Posts

• Top Ten Surprises After One Year as a PCV It has been exactly one year since I finished Pre-Service Training and swore in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer…
• 400 Days of Habits Some psychologists say that it takes 21 days to form a habit. Some say 66 days. Well, here are are—398 days into living in Morocco. Almost 400 days. These are…
• Our Soundtrack When traveling to a new place one of the first things we often notice are the sounds, especially when the sounds are new and loud. Eventually, if you stay in…
• A New Normal: Paying Bills I’ve been a bill-paying adult since before the millennium started, Chris six years longer. For our apartment, we paid rent, electric, and internet bills. We paid cellphone service bills, car…
• The ways Peace Corps made me normal Peace Corps is not for everyone. It is not an easy decision to pick up, move across the world unknown of where you will live, work or learn. PCVs all…
• How to Share Grilled Cheese If there is one thing Peruvians have mastered, it’s sharing! I never thought I would be able to share the way my country hosts do. When there is nothing left,…
• When the Odd Becomes the Norm… Every culture and country comes complete with things that to the casual, outside observer would appear odd and strange. It’s these “quirks” and differences that make living in new cultures…
• 8 Signs you are tamana tsara Tamana tsara: To be well settled. To be well integrated.   1.  VARY VARY VARY. Rice is life. You can do some serious damage to a Malagasy portion of rice….
• “Slowing Down” The greenest pastures I’ve ever seen, pulled by Pinocchio strings like a puppet I’m controlled by the essence of the vast blue… The fields of cows black and brown Walking…
• I Never Thought I’d Think… The past year serving as a PCV here in Ethiopia has thrown me for many loops and changed me in countless ways. The things I now consider normal, or not…
• When “Going to the Mountain” Does Not Involve S’mores The final prompt for the Blogging Abroad Boot Camp: My new normal (aka the behaviors we required). One of the biggest PC adages in existence is that service makes…
• New Normal My US “normal” was sort of out there already for people who don’t do technical theater/live event work. Until a week before I left I was working as a stage manager,…
• My new normal. Blending in and making new friendsMy new normalNine months have passed since disembarking from the 747, for the most part I’m feeling settled into my new community and my days…
• Top 10 Things I Never Thought I Would Become Accustomed To… Well folks, we are to the final challenge of the 2016 blogging abroad challenge, #12. I going to say up front that some of the things I am about to…
• A New Normal My New Normal“Miandry fa Gasy” We wait because we are Malagasy. When I first heard this phrase, it was my second month at site (5th…
• New Normal This week marked the two-year anniversary of my departure from Boston and arrival in Ethiopia. To honor that milestone, I’m going to reflect on some of the ways I have…

Check back for later additions to this list!