Well, yeah, 1992 was rough. And I wasn't really a tourist. I lived and worked there for two years. The Soviet Union collapsed right before my eyes and I joined the protesters on the streets. There were food shortages in Leningrad, and one time I almost got arrested for stealing toilet paper out of the bathroom of one of the foreign hotels. But as hard as it was, I had great friends there. And I still feel very close to them, today.

As for culture shock - I experienced a lot more culture shock when I returned to America because suddenly I was overwhelmed with too many choices, plus when I returned I had an accent!!

As a tourist, you probably would not need to worry too much about culture shock. But when you live in a foreign country for a long time, it definitely changes you. You adapt, you do what you need to do to belong. In my case, I went so native that when I returned to America, it seemed foreign to me. I guess the amount of culture shock one experiences, depends on how permeable you are to cultures. In my case, I cannot help but imitate people around me. It doesn't matter what their culture is, if I am around them for any length of time, I start to sound like them.