Traveling by plane, train or automobile is never easy — and if your journey takes long, you can expect to be exhausted when you finally roll into bed.

So why not arrive a few days earlier, recover your energy and start at your language school feeling energetic? The course starts on Monday, you arrive on Thursday, or Wednesday, giving you a whole weekend and more.

This sounds like a good idea but often its exactly the wrong thing to do. The reason is culture shock.

Fresh out of bed, you are now alone in a new country. The homestay family is at work. You wander around, but know little about the bus routes, where to buy food or what to do. People speak a different language, so you can’t easily ask for directions. Turn on the TV, but its all in a foreign language and this is when you get bored, lonely, and you still have days to go before anything will happen.

If you arrive on Saturday, or Sunday, the weekend is quickly over and on Monday morning you are a bit sleepy, but so is everyone else. You quickly learn about your classes, new friends and really start your life overseas. By the end of the day you are exhausted but know that there is still plenty to do.