Culture Shock 1st Round American VS Chinese

"Don't cry man, things happen..."

Before following text, I have to disclaim that I did not went back China for almost five years; therefore, I cannot assure that what I am going to write about is still the same today. When living in NY, first difference I realized is people actually say phrases like “excuse me” or “Oh, I am sorry!” when they tried to passing by you or accidentally step on your feet or small body clash. At the beginning, I felt so strange that people  frequently apologize for such small things. Because in China, the clash of bodies will be unavoidable for many situations—get on the bus, get off the bus, walking on the road, shopping in the stores, and so on. In China, people tend to careless about what happened around them as long as it’s not life threatening, invasive. For example, in China, if someone accidentally step on the other person’s foot, neither of them will even look at the other unless the force was painful or aggressive. In contrast, I saw great difference in New York. People, in general, tend to be very polite. They were going to say “excuse me” when passing by, say “I am sorry” when accidentally intruded others space. I think it can be a result of the culture difference between the US and China. A visible Chinese culture is being low profile. On the other hand, Americans like to keep personal space and maintain orderly sequence. Invisible culture of Chinese is the practice of common understanding for actions, and silence is gold while Americans culture includes individualism which highly emphasizes personal space and respect toward other individuals, therefore value polite conversations. However, it does not mean Chinese do not respect each other but the understanding of“Hey, Things happen.” therefore, between Chinese, collation of abusive language or actual fight for personal space intrusion was rare while if the same thing happened to Americans, people will consider the one who intruded and kept silence as rude and aggressive and tend to result in arguments for certain people. For example, once I was on the line to pay money in a store, an old Chinese man moved backward and step on the American old lady’s feet, the old man just had a look at lady and quickly looked away without saying anything, the American old lady was smile and been polite at the old man when he was in the store but once he left, the American lady started swearing and complaining about how rude the old man is. Guess no matter you are Chinese or American, we all got both sides, the only difference is that how and when we present it.
Oh, by the way, there is unlikely to have second round for this post.

Best and Peace.