> Not just for people from Asia, this applies to anybody going to a different country.

I agree with you. That said, there is higher probability of Asian students being in Europe and USA for a Ph.D than vice versa (context of this post). Therefore, while the advice is indeed applicable to anyone - I prefer it to be directed in order to be more concrete. The reason being Asian societies (certainly Indian ones) are not individualistic in nature. Therefore, everyone tends to follow the crowd. There is a set pattern - school -> college -> job/Masters/Ph.D -> House -> Marriage -> Kids. A departure from the usual is not encouraged and even frowned upon.

But even within the western world, even within Europe I've seen people going to a different country and immediately looking for people, restaurant and news source from their original country.

Go and spend some time on a country like China. You have the exact same problem but in reverse - westerners sticking with an English speaking social group, living in areas with large numbers of other westerners and so on.

The human experience is really quite universal.

Many English-speakers who live in China quickly find that any attempts to mix freely with local Chinese people is inevitably followed up by hard-to-refuse invitations to personally tutor their sister's or manager's young child in English. It's easier to draw the line so that these "invitations" don't come.

I know the type of situation you're talking about but it's also a cop-out of an excuse.

Firstly because there are plenty of westerners in China that are perfectly happy getting by completely in English regardless of anything else. 'Not wanting to turn in to a part time English teacher' doesn't account for the large number of westerners who have been in China a few years but still can't communicate in Chinese beyond 'knee how' and 'shay shay'.

Secondly, it's easy enough to say no to those situations, you just need to learn to say it the Chinese way, with a non-committal 'maybe' sometime at some undetermined point in the future.

Finally it's also possible to build a local social circle with people who aren't interested in English - my Chinese improved the most when I did this.

Yeah, citation definitely needed.

One of these groups is emigrating to places far from home in large numbers. The other is not.

No. A lot of us seek to immerse in a different culture by studying in a foreign country.

Citation not needed. This is merely ignorance

> Western (European/American) culture advocates "getting out of your comfort zone"

Citation extremely needed.

Anecdotally, I've seen this happen with pretty much any international group in a university environment when there is enough of concentration of that group to support an expat community.

I don't think you have to totally abandon your previous culture, but I think part of living aboard (or universities in general) is experiancing new things outside the classroom or lab.

It doesn't even take a concentration of a group of a specific origin. Take Erasmus students, for example, it's terrible. They come from various countries, so they do not speak the same mother language and do not share an identical culture; but they'll always stay together, always speak in English and not in the local language, and almost never mix with locals students or others locals (except the local drug dealer of course).

I was an Erasmus student, and some of what you describe definitely happened. A combination of factors like all the local students arrived before semester started and got the nice dorms, so all the foreigners were together in the old dorm without kitchens. All the local students had social groups and weren't looking for new friends the way other exchange students are (none of us were first years). We spoke French among ourselves because not everyone spoke English, but when we first arrived socialising in French was difficult, especially in groups, and other foreigners are much more patient and forgiving of that. I actually ended up making friends with a bunch of locals by joining a soccer team, but even there half the players were other foreigners. I wouldn't describe it as terrible at all, but everyone has an opinion.

Former Erasmus student here and I want to say that it's brilliant. Sure, you don't really end up living like a local, but you get to know people from all over Europe and the rest of the world. That's a great thing in and of itself. No need for locals. Sure, if you get to know locals that's great as well, but not doing so is not in any way "terrible".

Having only experienced it from the outside (observing perfectly functional flocks if "Erasmusses" not making local contact here, seeing friends join such flocks abroad) I even feel tempted to say "you learn a lot about all kinds of countries, except for the one you go to". The intensity of socialising inside those groups is staggering and part of the lack of contact with the local population might well be that those just can't compete in being as interesting: answering "here" to the conversation starter "where are you from" instantly makes you the least interesting person in the room. Kind of like the backpacker hostel vibe.

A decade or two back I met the daughter of a friend in Italy. She was English and studying Italian as part of her university degree in Wales. She complained that she wasn't really learning that much.

One part was hard for her to change - being fair and blond. However, apart from that, she had chosen to go to Florence - one of the few places where people did speak a fair bit of English. She also shared a flat with an English girl friend. They both remarked that one of the other guys on their course was also in Florence but they never saw him - he had joined rugby club and socialised only with locals - funnily enough his Italian had gotten much better...

How does being fair and blonde impede learning?

Presumably, Italians are less likely to use Italian to communicate with "fair and blonde" women.