* It was incredibly easy to meet other foreigners, and not necessarily westerners, far from that actually. I now have genuine friends on every continent.
* Since you're on the same boat, you can relate. Given how unique the work and life environment can be, it's nice to be able to talk with people who'll understand you.
* Making native friends isn't easy, even when you're making real efforts.
I don't have an unlimited amount of energy I can put into socializing, so after a short while I stopped trying too hard. Even the Korean friends I made before my move weren't too interested in hanging out once I lived there.
Remember the U.S is a nation of immigrants.
He's discussing the same situation mentioned in the article, but in reverse.
Contrast that to Canada, where the term we used was "mosaic" (when I was growing up in the 70s & 80s).
The problem with "melting pot" was that in melting everything becomes indistinct and bland, where as in a salad bowl, the pieces remain distinct but work together as a whole to make enhance the entire salad.
I live in Silicon Valley and am married to an immigrant, and live next door to a house where I don't believe everyone that lives in it speaks English. Meanwhile, a man that ran on a campaign on explicit xenophobia and implicit white nationalism is now president.
In my world, it's not. I mean a common language is just a pragmatic thing. After all, you're not going to move up the economic ladder without knowing the lingua franca. I certainly wouldn't expect to have the job I have now in say Korea, because I can't speak or read Korean.
My family has gone to Dia De Los Muertos events, and no one in our family has any ties to Mexico. At the same time, I grew up in the rural midwest where one of the biggest regional events was Fiesta Italiana, and there aren't any Italian immigrants left, and the people left with Italian surnames don't know anything more about Italy or Italian culture than I do.
Most people live in the cities, and deal with immigrants and foreign cultures on a daily basis. The people that live in the rural area don't, and they're the ones that elected him. So who says who's right?
His words and his choice of advisors speak for themselves.
While I think that's true, I still think the original point that OP made was valid: you're going from a culture that you're very very used to, into one that's radically different. I think that comparison is still valid in this context. Unless there's another layer to your statement that I'm not seeing...?
I, myself have fallen into the English foreigner trap. It's exhausting to make Japanese friends, that in the end you really don't get anywhere with, casually.
I've gravitated towards existing hobbies, and soon will enter a bekka. I still want to blame my non-existing Japanese for my lack of true Japanese friends.
Koreans have a saying about their neighbors: "The Chinese love you rudely. The Japanese hate you politely."
When I was studying Chinese in PKU, it was similar. Part of the problem was that the university wasn't really setup to mix foreigners with Chinese students: we were studying at PKU, but using very different facilities. Of course, if you made an effort, you made friends, some of which I have today (incidentally, almost all of them went abroad to the USA as PKU undergrads tend to do).