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by aaronax 1287 days ago
What are the concrete benefits of such a well-rounded background?
3 comments

Not OP, but as someone who also moves around a lot, I'd say a few. Mainly, you don't get too entrenched in the local culture. You learn to kind of just be able to blend in with anyone. I could talk to some blue hair about radical ideas today, talk TCP pros and cons with some reserved networking guru tomorrow, and talk pro wrestling with a 50 year old redneck trucker the next day. Not that I'm super knowledgeable in all of those subjects, but would be just as comfortable doing all three. It's not as simple as having some extroverted ability or anything - anyone could do that, you just learn enough about people of different backgrounds and regions to understand how to interact that you really only get through exposure.

You also don't hold awful stereotypes that most people have - even most of those in a place like here. The south isn't all racist, the coast isn't all snobby, the southwest isn't full of dangerous cartels murdering everyone, middle America isn't a bunch of uneducated hicks, etc.

Not the person you asked, but it's harder to have harmful conceits about people and places when you've been to or met people from them. I've noticed that as the internet has grown, the rhetoric has moved from "lol, Americans" to "why do you vote for these people" to a lot more empathy for how our system is designed to inhibit change (good and bad).

I've changed my understanding of other countries the same way. Mostly from meeting people online, but sometimes in person. Just something as simple as someone asking "what is ketchup?" in line at an elevator at a convention can expand the mind. How do you describe ketchup? Everyone knows ketchup! It made me wonder what else was normal and obvious to me that isn't to someone who's never experienced it.

i mean, aside from those already listed? every 3 years i had to rebuild my life from scratch. when hard times come, do u want the person who's only ever experienced one way of life? or would you rather be with the person who has continuously had new challenges thrown at them, who has consistently been forced to learn a new way of life?