Cho
Last night a few of us were taking a stroll and eating ice cream from mcdonald’s (or macdon’s). We talked about how the American and Chinese cultures contradict themselves; they are not what they perceive to be. America has a very individualistic culture, we only think about ourselves. We are not team players, we only think about making our life better, getting ahead. However, we are very generous and courteous, and always say please and thank you. If I bump into someone, even if it was my fault, I say excuse me. We wait in lines, take turns, and let people in front of us on a busy highway. China is just the opposite. They are seen as a very collectivistic culture. They do everything in groups, and work well in teams. On the other hand, lines do not exist. There is just a crowd at the front with everyone trying to get there. Although, I think I’m becoming quite a good budger. Lanes on the street do not matter, people just go, honking to warn others they are moving. When walking down the street, no one moves out of the way or says excuse me/ sorry. The man at Carrafour who dropped the liter of pop on my foot did not seem to care even when I yelled “ow.� They find it weird when we say thank you for something, because it is not the custom here. But in America people would think it was rude or insulting if people did not say thanks for everything. I find this contradiction of cultures very interesting. Then, we saw about 30-40 middle aged people working out in a bike lot. They had music blaring and were doing a dance in sync. It looked like a cross between the hokey pokey and aerobics. It was so cool, I tried to get pictures but they didn’t turn out very well.
I met the cutest girl in class today named Cho. She asked me write my name so she could pronounce it better. When she saw that I was writing with my left hand she did the same thing and asked if had been using the wrong one. I said no, I’m just the weird one that’s left-handed, and most people are right-handed (it can be tough living in a right-handed world). Cho said that people in China write with their right hand and eat with their left hand, like me, at which point I immediately felt cooler.
Shannon