Surviving Survivalism - How to Avoid Survival Culture Shock

Is it time to join the 'preppers'? How to survive the climate-change apocalypse

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When a person travels to another region of the world, even where the people speak their own language, they find there are many cultural differences. When those rules, behaviors, and social customs you always understood no longer serve you well, the traveler experiences culture shock. How much it affects any particular traveler can range from mild confusion to sincere fear and anxiety. Unfortunately, these travelers sometimes have a terrible trip but preparing for the differences in culture can help. Resources to study include updated travel guides and the Kwintessential website which has a lot of information for business travelers, but leisure travelers can benefit as well.

Many regions of the world have local festivals, celebrations and national holidays that may be taking place when you are visiting. Knowing the local calendar can help you in two ways:. You can learn ahead of time about the origins of the holiday and be prepared to join in — even if on the fringe at the start — and share in the culture. You will be prepared if stores and restaurants are closed and you have to find alternatives to entertain and feed yourself for a bit of time.

If you have friends or family who have traveled where you are going, see if you can get a local contact — someone they met along their trip, for example. Someone to walk you through the basics, so to speak.

You can find websites that will help you get in touch with someone at your destination. Women travelers will find hermail. Befriend your hotel desk clerk, concierge, tour guide, host — even the local cafe owner — anyone whom you will see on a regular basis and can be your go-to person to answer questions and clear up confusions. Be friendly with reserve in many countries to everyone you meet and smile.

Hine tests out whether stunts on survival shows will work. On one shoot in Thailand, she was leading a small group through the jungle when they stumbled across an opium farm. Guards with AKs spotted the group. They were chased for four hours, over tangled terrain and across water channels and up and down ridges, in the sweltering heat. It is those moments where you really learn who you are and how strong you can be.

I remember making sure my team were OK, and then having to wander away from them and having an emotional moment to myself. Hine grew up loving the outdoors. Her father was a geologist and family holidays were spent in the UK hiking, climbing mountains and exploring forests. Before university, she took a year out and spent it in New Zealand where she trained as a raft guide, then throughout her degree in outdoor education, she worked as a part-time instructor and mountaineer.

I ask her if female survival experts approach a situation differently. When there is no safety net, sometimes you just learn to fly. Guest post by Shieila, who lives the survivalist lifestyle in New Mexico with her husband and son. Thank you for sharing your story and your tips! Not because such preparations are not wise.

My vehicles carry enough supplies for comfort for a week in a blizzard on the roadside. I laughed because people think they will leave the city with a bag of supplies and go camping for the rest of their life. Or a year, or a month. I lived in the Amazon missionary with a canoe, hammock, mosquito net and shotgun for a year. I came out of the jungle with malaria, ameobic dysentery, and I looked like a skeleton and was approaching death at age I also camped in my younger years in extreme cold in the USA.

I slept with bedding on the ground after wiping the snow away and snuggling my bedding into leaves. The surburbanites will die if they think it is a camping trip. I actually would try to stay home and hold the fort if at all possible. Or relocate to a house of some sort as you have apparently done. They will go camping for the rest of their life. That just will be a whole lot shorter than they expected. If I had questions before I have so many now! My husband and I have always had long term plans to do something similar to what they have done, but I always looked around at the barren state of things here and thought that in order to accomplish our dreams we would need to move to a more generous piece of earth.

How encouraging to know that if you can make it work here then so can we! True blue all of it. I live in Suburban central NJ and most everyone thinks all is well. They will be hungry. There are not many who understand the danger in that one simple thought. Let the power grid go down or the financial system collapse, and in two weeks…. Seriously, though, just look at how they handled Katrina. My worst stress is deciding what kind of bread to make today. I feel terribly tied to my job as a means to support future plans if the system does maintain. Many people feel stuck between worlds.

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We even have some community members here in that situation. Your entire biological determinism has been shaped by TV, Pop-Culture, Corporate consumerism et al, to make you feel frightened to let go. And…if you can make any of your communications gadgets work for you…that will be beneficial. Listen to our podcast 12, on our home page — survivingsurvivalism.

Just found it by chance, though I read lots on this topic. I was especially interested in your comment re: So, we live in a fairly rural area, with a cottage about 4 hours away that would be our ultimate destination asap. We keep gas cans so we have enough to get us there, and know the backroads. We also keep plenty of food, water, all necessities here with us in case of a delay in the journey.

It sounds like you have done quite a good bit of planning. What will you have lost? A couple days vacation? Also many ran out of gas after maybe making it miles, because most of that time was moving a few feet at a time, then idling again. I shudder to think how many might have ridden out Rita while on the road had Rita not swerved east. Watch for how much gold and silver demand are up and when real cost are skyrocketing…these are all signals that people with real money are jumping out of the stock market… as they have been doing quietly..

Id be ready to bug out then…if things quiet down…you can go back to your home…. Later, we moved and had water for 2 hours am each day during the dry season. We learned to ration, let me tell you! We also washed clothing by hand and frequently cooked over an open fire to save on gas. Our power goes out for extended periods, as well. We did it for years. Good morning, excellent post. If you will allow us to add something it would be most appreciated. My bride of twenty three years and I have lived in many places such as you describe.

Sudan in was without question the most horrific. We too, cooked, washed, foraged, scavenged, did without, and were always concerned where the next meal was coming from and in what form it would arrive. But beyond all the hardship there is one thing that set South Sudan apart from all other places: Death from starvation, malnutrition, disease, violence, and exposure will take a grievous toll.

Blessings and wish you the very best. My favorite part is 4. It is not about the gadgets. Look, I use camping to help my kids understand life with out power in the summer. However, here in AZ in the winter, I make fires in my home made firepit and cook off the grid for a reason. To learn how much wood I need to make a meal in my cast iron pots.

How long will this fire take to get my coals ready to cook on. How much work is this for one meal in a pot? But it was the best darn meal I had ever eaten! Then I cleaned it outside. How long did that take another 20 minutes. But, we can practice at home. This fall my family should not be surprised if I turn the breaker off for a weekend. Because really that is all that is. You have to know how to live where you are. What trees can you eat from?

What trees have a medicinal purpose or plants. What can you use and how much of something to substatue for medicine?

All skills you have to learn or get books on. Society is not going to be plesant. Not just a life style, a new way of society. If I am not ready mentaly, my family will be overwhelmed. Good luck to all who choose to make the lifestyle change. Because it is HUGE and more rewarding each day. I am new to the whole preppers thingy but I have to tell you that people who understand that difficult times are probably coming are smart.

I am from former USSR. Life was pretty good, had basic essentials not close to so much choice as in US but still had pretty ok supply of food etc. Then within a month USSR collapsed. We thought we lived in the best country in the world and were protected from all evils. Let me tell you what the first 10 years after collapse was like. People were starving, electricity was hardly couple of hours a day if any, then there was no gasoline at all. There were almost no trees left in some cities because people would cut them for wood.

A lot of people managed to immigrate and that was saving many families as they were sending money back home. Things are getting a lot better now and for a visitor might seem to be all glamorous and rich but the bottom of the population is still suffering with high unemployment it is ok in major cities like Moscow but not in peripheral cities. I also lived in Europe and I am very worried with situation there especially that it is overtaken by Arab or Turkish. Spain is collapsing and rioting is quite common. Many places like Libya or Syria especially Lebanon have enjoyed pretty good life style but look what is happening now.

It is really silly that some think that US is immune to this. It is not only not immune but spoiled with handouts nation is more then ready for collapse. Flower, thank you so much for sharing your experience. I was happily surprised to learn that preparing is no longer the interest or hobby of fringe elements or off-balance types. The internet is full of great advice and lots of resources. This article, for instance, outlines some of the silly mistakes people can make in their thinking, when they consider surviving bad times, and is a good warning. I now have to struggle with how to deal with regular daily life.

Dealing with a crisis, of short or long duration, is impossible for me, save the compilation of virtual lists and plans and educating myself about what could happen or how to survive it, should I somehow be able to change my present picture. Even so, some of us ants have already been crushed by the first stages of the coming crisis, and we watch in horror as our chances and opportunities to become self-sufficient fade into the distance. For those of us who are NOT enjoying our plasma tvs, or any tv for that matter, who do not have the typical American lifestyle and who are just ignoring the signs of the times due to laziness or head-in-the-sand-ness, for those of us whose jobs and livelihood are destroyed and who are frequenting food banks in order to at least have enough to buy needed medicines without a former cadillac insurance policy, for those of us who are far past our youth, and yet still raising small children due to unforeseeable tragedies, when it should be empty nest time, etc, the whole thing is just so supremely out of reach.

My message to all of you who have been blessed with means: I hear your fear and frustration. I can see how reading survival lit and prepper blogs can leave you feeling like you need tons of cash. Try doing what you can with what you have. Learn to identify edible weeds in your area. This can be done at the library or from internet resources if you cannot afford to buy plant ID books.

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Wash your clothes in the tub after you bathe. This will actually save you water and thus money. Learn to cook dry beans. They are cheap and nutritious. Again this saves you money. If you have any access to soil, plant a few of those beans. I have successfuly grown dry beans from the grocery store. If you have access to wood and a safe place to burn it try cooking on a wood fire. There are things you CAN do now to learn.

That knowledge is far more valuable than stuff. Best wishes for you on your journey. When you go grocery shopping buy a couple extra cans of stuff. Part of that plan is to only buy what you normally eat. Make spread sheets of what is in what container and the expiration date. When that date approaches eat that stuff and buy a new one. I agree with your admonition, if you can, do it now. I hear these muddy excuses every day of my life.

Just got through with another one today. But here is the grind. She has sorry, lazy, pampered kids that are full grown and do nothing to help her. And I am sick to death of it. I could care less what happens to non preppers or late preppers after shft and if that makes me less than I should be then so be it. In closing, you could do something for yourself except point fingers at those of us who bite the bullet and got the job done.

So be that too. Awe… this makes me really sad. Your post is a few years old, but I hope you come back around and read this. But yeah, it would sure help if you wanted to be super comfortable. It would help us too! These things can be so overwhelming. I felt that stirring just reading your comment. But rather than giving in to that sensation, just think small. Solar would sure be swell, huh? But what do you suppose would happen if the world went dark and there, on a single street or road, sat a single house with the lights on???

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They are more comfort items than survival items. And again, the lights go out, the town you are in is ultimately silent…. So what you really need to start out is candles, some oil lamps with oil, a fire pit, and some cast iron cookware. You have a way to see and a way to cook and boil water.

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