How to overcome homesickness as an intern in China

People decide to go and live abroad for various reasons, like to intern in China, teach English in China, experience living in a different environment but career is one of the most common reasons. Whatever the reason is for choosing to pursue an internship in China, you may find yourself at some point missing home and becoming seriously homesick.

You should not be embarrassed for being homesick because it is normal for someone to miss their home, family and friends. However, do not let homesickness prevent you from enjoying life in China.

What you can do to overcome homesickness:

Prepare in advance.

After you get an internship and ready to come to China, then you should be mentally prepared to move. Plan ahead and be ready for the fact that you will miss home so think of what things you can take with you that will ease your homesickness like pictures etc.

Keep in touch with family and friends from home.

When missing home terribly, it is not a good idea to avoid contacting people back home. With all the social networking sites like Whatsapp, Wechat, Skype, FaceTime etc we able to keep in touch with them so you can be up-to-date with all the happenings back home. But of course, do not spend the whole day chatting or calling your friends and family because you also need to spend time meeting new people and making new friends in your new place.

Make new friends.

Making new friends has its benefits, make an effort to meet new people and make new local friends. This will make it easier for you to learn and improve your Chinese language skills. Having foreign friends might help you feel less of an outsider in the new environment and also help you understand the culture and way of doing things around.

Write a diary or a blog about your experiences in China.

Writing is one of the effective ways of expressing feelings and sharing it with other people. You could either start an online blog about your life as an intern in China or write a personal diary. Moreover, blogging will keep you more focused on all the things going on around you and you will want to have a lot of interesting things to write about. This will help you to be more engaged in your new environment and you will be having fun to loneliness.

Explore the environment.

As we all know, China is an interesting country with a long history waiting to be explored. Find places to visit, make time to take walks, go to a park, if you are more athletic, go for a jog or you can invite friends or colleagues to take a trip with you to other cities in China. This will be an enjoyable experience that will take away your feeling of homesickness.

A home cooked meal

Treating yourself a home cooked meal can be very therapeutic. Go to a nice foreign supermarket like Sanyuan Qiao market or Jenny Lou and buy the ingredients that make your favorite home cooked food. If you are feeling more adventurous and keen to keep busy, check a proper foreign restaurant and go out for a nice dinner/lunch.

Keep doing your hobbies

Find places to do your hobbies in China or find new ones as there so many things to do. Maintaining a favorite sport or activity helps bring balance and routine back to your daily life and can make new spaces feel a little more familiar and welcoming. Don’t feel like you have to give up the things you did back home. There are probably people doing the same activities in your new location so do a little research to find them, and you might even end up making some new friends.

Talk to friends about how you feeling

It is better to confide in others, people go through this kind of thing and finding someone who has will make it easier since they understand what you going through. They might help you cope and get through homesickness.

Even if been homesick is normal, you don’t want to spend all of your time in China wishing you were home, so don’t let homesickness bring you down. You can choose to follow these tips or come up with your own strategies, so long as you make your internship in China experience a time filled with good memories. Who knows, by the time you return home you’ll be homesick for China instead!