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Behavior Guidelines
How should I act while in a foreign country?
Do:
- research your host country before you travel
- be patient with the process and courteous at all times
- be considerate and aware that you are in a different culture
- remember that you are a visitor and a guest in their country
- listen to the advice of your guide or host
- show an interest in the host country's customs and culture and try to adapt to those customs
- go sightseeing and take plenty of photographs
- bring small gifts for guides and administrators
- dress appropriately for different occasions: meetings with officials, sight-seeing, etc.
- dress your child nicely when meeting with social workers or other people involved with the adoption
- be flexible about the length of your stay
- remember to be patient when there is a setback
- make apologies for mistakes made
- learn some of the country's language before you travel, and use it! Your efforts will be appreciated.
- bring the host country's language dictionary with you and try to learn more about the language while you are there
- remember that others will adopt through your source after you. Try to leave the country with a favorable impression as to not make things more difficult for those who follow you
Don't:
- be impatient
- be inconsiderate, loud, noisy, or argumentative
- overdo on alcohol
- put yourself on a time schedule and/or set guidelines that your hosts cannot meet or will have no inclination to try to meet
- try to "buy" your way for faster service
- seek or expect to find your culture in a foreign country
- form a clique with other Americans and shut out others
- be afraid to socialize with your hosts
- make demands and expect everyone to cater to you
- indulge in political conversation with people in your host country
- expect a foreign bureaucracy to work any more efficiently than that in the U.S.
- complain about or criticize different customs and attitudes found in the host country
- argue if you are told to return tomorrow by the orphanage, passport office, etc.
- be afraid to ask questions; but phrase them carefully
- expect sterile conditions. Remember that your child has made it this far, and will survive even of conditions are not up to your standards
- take offense if you are treated rudely or brusquely; the best way to handle such situations is to rise above them, stay calm, and not respond.
Reprinted (with minor changes) by kind permission of the Latin American Parent Association
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