Culture Shock
When I first arrived Holland, I encountered culture shock. Now, it’s time for my French visitors to experience the shocks.
When they ask me questions about what they observed on the street, on television screen, in the bar…It is time for me to think about the cultural differences.
My French visitors’ first finding is that Chinese people like story-telling, especially taxi drivers. Whenever they call a taxi, the driver would listen to stories in the radio while driving. They also found that on TV, there are lots of TV series on Chinese history.
The finding of my visitors is partially true. Yes, Chinese people like story-telling, we call it “ping shu”. (评书). Ping Shu is a traditional Chinese art of telling stories in a dramatic way. It is usually performed by one person. Most of the stories are about Chinese history.
Taxi drivers like Ping shu because they are lonely. What they don’t know about Beijing taxi drivers is that what they really like is to chat with passengers. There’s no way for them to discover that because of the language barrier.
It is also true that right now, on the screen of Chinese television there are lots of “history-stories”. I would rather to call them “pseudo-history”. It is not about Chinese history, not retelling Chinese history in the way of drama. It is nothing but stupid fictions or stupid fairy tales. There are more than 60 channels that I can receive with cable TV. However, whenever a show is hot, other channels would also run that show. So my choice is limited within 6, even less. Chinese government is going to push digital TV to the market. One of the reasons is that with digital television, people can have hundreds of channels to choose from. The authorities forget that it is not the number of channels limits people’s choice but the program itself. I bet with 300 hundreds channels, at least 250 channels are running the same program. The 50 left will run the same program soon or later.
Why there are so many boring and stupid fairy tales and pseudo-history stories running on television? The answer lies in the facts that there are so many areas that cannot be touched in China. The cultural revolution is one, and there are many more similar topics. In order to avoid the censorship, artists have to produce those stupid programs, which will lead to a down turn of social culture.
Secondly, they found there weren’t many “Chinese ideas” generated from brainstorming on wireless service in the near future. I was puzzled by the word “Chinese ideas”. They told me they were expecting some ideas based on Chinese traditional culture. Then, it is my turn to feel shock. I never image there would be “Chinese idea” or “French idea” or “American idea” on high technology services.
What makes the different perspective between my guests and I? Later in the afternoon, I figure out several reasons. Firstly, in the area of IT industry, China is at the same level as western countries, which makes no difference in Chinese ideas and western ideas. Secondly, almost all respondents have educational background in a Western county (including me). Our experiences in the western countries colored our eyes on the differences between the east and the west. So the ideas fixed by such group reflect rare Chinese characteristic. Besides that is my third reason, since modern technologies, including IT technology, are imported from the West. There’s no Chinese characteristic involved in. All my reasons point to one bigger picture: globalization.
Anyway, I am still wondering about Chinese ideas. Speaking about internet and mobiles, regardless of language, are there American website, French website, Dutch website or Chinese website?
I know Chinese sites carry more advertisements than websites from any other countries. Are there any other differences?
When they ask me questions about what they observed on the street, on television screen, in the bar…It is time for me to think about the cultural differences.
My French visitors’ first finding is that Chinese people like story-telling, especially taxi drivers. Whenever they call a taxi, the driver would listen to stories in the radio while driving. They also found that on TV, there are lots of TV series on Chinese history.
The finding of my visitors is partially true. Yes, Chinese people like story-telling, we call it “ping shu”. (评书). Ping Shu is a traditional Chinese art of telling stories in a dramatic way. It is usually performed by one person. Most of the stories are about Chinese history.
Taxi drivers like Ping shu because they are lonely. What they don’t know about Beijing taxi drivers is that what they really like is to chat with passengers. There’s no way for them to discover that because of the language barrier.
It is also true that right now, on the screen of Chinese television there are lots of “history-stories”. I would rather to call them “pseudo-history”. It is not about Chinese history, not retelling Chinese history in the way of drama. It is nothing but stupid fictions or stupid fairy tales. There are more than 60 channels that I can receive with cable TV. However, whenever a show is hot, other channels would also run that show. So my choice is limited within 6, even less. Chinese government is going to push digital TV to the market. One of the reasons is that with digital television, people can have hundreds of channels to choose from. The authorities forget that it is not the number of channels limits people’s choice but the program itself. I bet with 300 hundreds channels, at least 250 channels are running the same program. The 50 left will run the same program soon or later.
Why there are so many boring and stupid fairy tales and pseudo-history stories running on television? The answer lies in the facts that there are so many areas that cannot be touched in China. The cultural revolution is one, and there are many more similar topics. In order to avoid the censorship, artists have to produce those stupid programs, which will lead to a down turn of social culture.
Secondly, they found there weren’t many “Chinese ideas” generated from brainstorming on wireless service in the near future. I was puzzled by the word “Chinese ideas”. They told me they were expecting some ideas based on Chinese traditional culture. Then, it is my turn to feel shock. I never image there would be “Chinese idea” or “French idea” or “American idea” on high technology services.
What makes the different perspective between my guests and I? Later in the afternoon, I figure out several reasons. Firstly, in the area of IT industry, China is at the same level as western countries, which makes no difference in Chinese ideas and western ideas. Secondly, almost all respondents have educational background in a Western county (including me). Our experiences in the western countries colored our eyes on the differences between the east and the west. So the ideas fixed by such group reflect rare Chinese characteristic. Besides that is my third reason, since modern technologies, including IT technology, are imported from the West. There’s no Chinese characteristic involved in. All my reasons point to one bigger picture: globalization.
Anyway, I am still wondering about Chinese ideas. Speaking about internet and mobiles, regardless of language, are there American website, French website, Dutch website or Chinese website?
I know Chinese sites carry more advertisements than websites from any other countries. Are there any other differences?
posted by Beaver at 9:47 PM
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