Blog Topic #1 – Culture Shock

As I’ve mentioned in my previous post, last summer I spent a month in China. I am Chinese-American, so I do already have some experience with this different culture. Going to China just reinforced some of these experiences. I would say that in the bigger cities like Beijing and Shanghai, a lot of things are more modernized and westernized but there are still things that can be a cultural shock to people who have never been expose to it before.

One thing that people can find perturbing is spitting. I’ve seen people in Chinatown and 8th Ave (the predominant Asian neighborhood in Brooklyn) spit onto sidewalks numerous times and I’m still amazed every time someone does it. In American culture, you would not expect to see people just spitting in the streets because it’s unhygienic and rude. It’s just weird to be going around spitting in public while people are right next to you. But it happens a lot in China. Some people attribute it to the bad pollution in the cities which causes phlegm buildup and such. There is also a belief that evil spirits reside in the throat. I do not know if that is a factor in the spitting or not. My parents do spit in public sometimes. I think they are so use to people doing it back in China that they don’t find it abnormal so they don’t think twice about it when they do it here.

Another thing tourists have to get use to is the squatting toilet. Essentially, it is really just a hole in the ground. Even with normal toilets, some people still end up squatting on them. Whereas we may find squatting toilets inconvenient and unsanitary, they actually find sitting down on a normal toilet unhygienic as other people have been on it.

Another cultural shock could be communal dining. Sometimes in smaller restaurants, when it gets crowded, they seat strangers together to make maximum use of space. This also brings us to the matter of personal space. Most of us probably don’t mind being a bit close to each other at restaurants with our friends but not so much with strangers. Since this type of thing is more common there, they do not have the same reservations in this situation.

Speaking of restaurants, food is a huge part of any culture. It’s what brings a lot of families together. In America, food is usually just for sustenance and enjoyment. In China, however, there are symbolic meanings behind certain food. For example, strands of noodles symbolizes a long life which is why on New Years, noodles are always part of the meal. Eggs symbolize fertility; oranges for wealth; seeds for many children, etc. There are also some specific eating etiquettes. When you eat with your family, you wait until the elders take their first bite. You have to try to not leave anything behind in the bowl especially rice. You should not play around with the chopsticks and you should never hold it vertically in the bowl because it resembles incense sticks stuck into rice as offerings to the decease at funerals.

These are just some of the things I have observed in China and in my own family. Any of you have the same or different takes on any of these?

As a sidenote, I found this story endearing. I can’t really imagine any American athlete finding this behavior as one they should apologize for. Jon Montgomery, the Canadian Olympic gold medalist in Skeleton, apologized for celebrating his gold medal win. He said: “I had said at the beginning of the race that if I was in that position and I did get gold coming from behind that I was going to remain stoic and respectful because you never want to cheer when somebody else loses. But I have to apologise to Martins, that didn’t happen, I lost my mind when I saw the 0.07 come up and I was like I had stuck my finger in a light socket.” The conception that Canadians are really polite and apologize a lot might just be true afterall. ;)