As a Singaporean, learning how to live with people of different cultures seems to be no big feat. Being born in Singapore, I guess many of us probably do not really meet with much inter-cultural issues. I am one such example. Hence, what I am going to share is actually what one of my friends experienced while travelling in Italy.
As mentioned earlier, my friend and his wife were touring Europe, and Italy was one of his tour destinations. It was lunch time, and both of them were famished. They settled for a restaurant along the street and when their order came (spaghetti), they dug into their “noodles” and ate like how we (Singaporeans) do. Soon after, a lady, who was sitting on the table beside his, stood up and walked over. She actually went over and reprimanded my friend, for not eating the spaghetti the way they should be. (i.e. digging into the noodles and twirling it with the fork) My friend obviously felt offended to be actually told off in public in a foreign land!
I reckon that this is a pretty fine example of inter-cultural differences. Culture is defined as the behavior and belief characteristic of a particular social, ethnic or age group. To put it simply, it comprises of beliefs, values and certain behaviors that are imparted to us. And these behaviors and beliefs differ from people to people, from village to village. It is precisely these cultural differences that lead to many miscommunications and misunderstandings. Why so? For the same task/problem, people from different cultures learnt different ways/methods of solving it. Just take the pasta incident for example.
Task: Eating pasta (noodles)
French : Twirl pasta on fork
Singaporeans : “scoop” noodles with fork
So how does this difference lead to communication barriers? Taking a step back, one would easily realize that behaviors fall under the category of non-verbal communication. Different actions could be used to express the same issue. The difference lies in the way the how the individual was taught to do so. As the saying goes, action speaks louder than words. Indeed, an inappropriate gesture could result in dire communication errors. What’s important is to learn how different cultures work and to be tolerant and understanding.
By knowing the taboos of other cultures, one can effectively avoid unhappiness and misunderstandings. Knowing isn’t good enough. Understanding and being able to accept the fact that each culture has itstheir set of learned behaviors and values could very well help one look at a matter from a different perspective.
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2 comments:
Hey You Fei! I agree that learning how different cultures work and to be tolerant and understanding is very important especially in multiracial and multicultural Singapore. This is more so when you visit other countries since you now a guest in the host country.
Every race and cultural group has its own practices, beliefs and behaviors. It is important to understand why people need to do those things they do and to accept the fact that everyone has a different way of doing things in their countries. Therefore, researching on and understanding the cultures of the country that you are going to visit (be it for holidays or business trips) is critical so as not to offend anyone while on foreign land.
In the 'spaghetti' example that you described, I feel that it was not very appropriate for the woman to reprimand your friend in public. Firstly, being the 'host', one should be tolerant and educate visitors about our own cultures when we know that they are not doing things the 'right' way. Next, being overly emotional and fierce will not solve any problems. She should have just been polite and to explain the situation to your friend instead.
Ultimately, in order to prevent such situations from happening, we should try to understand that people in different countries have different cultures and practices and to learn to accept those differences. Also, being the hosts, we have an obligation to educate visitors about our own culture and try to be tolerant when they are ignorant about some of those cultures that we may have.
Hello You Fei, I can understand how tedious it is sometimes to learn about another country's culture and there are so many cultures out there. Hence, it would be useful if we could read up about the local culture and be prepared before visiting any countries. This way we can avoid stepping on their toes so to speak.
On the other hand, I also feel that this lady in Italy who reprimanded your friend about not eating properly should have been more understanding or tolerant. I know she may feel insulted by the ignorance of "these foreigners" but why was she the only one who spoke up? Why were they not reminded by other locals when they had spaghetti at other retaurants? Hence, I believe that the intercultural differences were evident here, but it was the lack of patience on the part of the Italian lady that led to the conflict here as the lack of cultural etiquette by the foreigners was not a personal attack.
Also, I disagree that there is a lack of cultural issues in Singapore as there is more diversity here than many other countries. I believe the government knows this, thus, it constantly promotes racial harmony in order to avoid conflict. I also feel that it is not our diverse cultural awareness that prevents us from offending people of other cultures, but rather our lack of participation in the practices of these other cultures. However, I am not saying that we do not have friends from other races. Instead, having friends from other races does not mean we bother to learn about the meaning behind their cultural practices.
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