Perception on Foreigners: East vs. West of Europe

Does nationality really make a difference?

Economic security is one of the reasons why lots of people simply go from East to West inside Europe, but also the reason why people from Asia and Africa populate the West more than the East. As Mr. Geert Wilders, Dutch politician, said: what you get in the end, is an amalgam of different nationalities and cultures that intermit with the local people, with consequences that need to be taken into account


By ROXANA CIUPARIU (roxana.ciupariu@wavemagazine.net)
from Bucharest, ROMANIA


When one goes to another country, he is by definition a foreigner. Backgrounds, settings, purposes for the visit, the languages spoken, the way one dresses, all these and many more, be it small or big factors, all influence the perception on foreigners and how they are viewed in different states.

The reasons why a person goes to another country are various. Vicky Grey, Language student from Wales, said she came to Pisa to study as an ERASMUS exchange student. Danni Burke, teacher from England, said she went to Venice to work as a language teacher in a high school. Amelie, an Economics student from France, was happily explaining that she would move to Bristol in 6 months to be with the guy she loves. These reasons, and many more, create the image the foreigner gets in that country; they are part of his entire being, once in the new land. People will judge him or her based on different things, although mostly starting with the reasons of arrival.

Economic security is one of the reasons why lots of people simply go from East to West inside Europe, but also the reason why people from Asia and Africa populate the West more than the East. What you get in the end, is an amalgam of different nationalities and cultures that intermit with the local people, with consequences that need to be taken into account, as Mr. Geert Wilders, Dutch politician said in a TV show on RT7, especially when it comes to Muslim communities populating the Netherlands.

Adapting and the language barrier

Koos Klauser, a Dutch student looks at the millions of Indonesians coming to Netherlands and he is amazed by the way they manage to integrate almost perfectly into the Dutch society: they study, they work, and they have a decent life without causing problems or being considered illegal immigrants.

However, these people and many more will always be perceived as foreigners no matter what they do, how they behave or how they dress. Regarding the dressing code, it could be perceived as normal to dress the way one used to and most people want to hold on to their own tradition. But once you are in a different country, you have to make some efforts to adapt. If that requires respecting some rules, learning the language or just changing a little bit your dressing code, it should be done in a manner not to lose oneself, but enough to adapt.

The language problem seems to be the biggest problem when you find yourself in another country, and it has a lot to do with adapting. If you go to work or study, most probably you get to speak English or French or some other well-known international language inside the respective institution, as it is the case of Danni, mentioned in the beginning. But what happens when you get out of the parameter? You get in touch with the real life, so you need to speak the language of that country. For Danni that is all right, since she already knows Italian. Sure, there will be lots of differences in the way she, as a foreigner speaks, starting from the accent, which is never like the one of a native, and continuing with the vocabulary and the speed of talking. However, in most of the cases, she will be appreciated for making an effort to adapt.

East vs. West

In the more developed West of Europe, life is more expensive, but in the same time easier to live. People mostly earn a fair amount of money compared to the work they do. They also get the chance to take their time and travel or, generally do the things they find suitable for them. Tea Bernadini from Italy said that after graduating she worked 3 years and then went around the world for 1 year and a half. In the East of Europe, people work a lot for a salary that most of the times doesn't even represent their value or is not in accordance with the amount of time and effort invested in the work. They get stressed once home, because there are other problems that need to be thought of. Also, most of the retired people in the Eastern part of Europe spend their lives trying to survive with a wretched pension.

Finally, there is the question: how different are you perceived inside Europe? East European countries, part of the former soviet bloc seems to be more opened to foreigners, to be impressed by their presence and to desire their involvement in social life, mainly because they were deprived of relations with other countries for decades. However, there is also the perception that since a person had enough money to come there for whatever reasons then he or she definitely has more money than a local. "Wow, he's French and came here! He sure has more money than me", Florentina Gheorghe, student at SNSPA, from Romania commented on a guy she met, who came from France to work in Romania for 6 months.

On the other hand, Western Europe is so used with foreigners that they treat them as regular people in most of the cases, not even paying too much attention where they came from. There is the 1-to-2-minutes regular "where are you from?" and "what are you doing here?" and then things go back to a normal discussion.


(Published: 11.10.2009.)