When I studied English in middle school in China, I heard something called culture difference but I couldn’t comprehend that. Since I came to America, I finally realized what the culture differences are. I lived and studied with Americans for half of a year and I found sometimes it is hard or complicated to work or communicate with the locals just because we lived in different countries and had different experiences. I’m going to tell you something funny with pictures and explain the different behaviors affected by different cultures.

I found some illustrations online about the differences between Chinese and Western cultures. Those pictures came from a German artist.In the right image he represents Western culture in a blue pictograph and in the left image he shows Chinese culture in a pictograph with a red background. Some of them I have experienced deeply. I’ll share my stories and something happen on my friends to show you the surprising culture differences.

Western people like to express their ideas directly but as a Chinese, sometimes we need to say everything carefully. The artist uses a straight line between two dots to illustrate a conversation or sharing of ideas between two westerners.  To illustrate the Chinese expression of ideas, the artist draws a long, line that goes around and crosses over itself.   Assume there’s a situation that one of my friends asks me to hang out with him but I’m actually tired. I can just say to my American friends that I’m tired and I don’t want to go. However, I can’t just say no to my Chinese friends. We think that people who invite you to somewhere are treating you as a closed friend. They will think you are not their friend any more if you don’t go. So we have to say something reasonable to refuse politely to express that I’m very willing to go but unfortunately I can’t just because some incidents or emergencies. We sometimes do this in order to keep our friendships.

The Western people will say they are happy when they  feel happy.  Chinese people will say they are happy whereas they actually not. In China, every family believe that a successful person should being smooth (it means people should leave some opportunities when they are talking) and always compliment others. That means being straight to people sometimes will just get the opposite of what one wishes. One of my mom’s good friends invited us to her house during the Spring Festival. She was a nice and kind woman but she couldn’t cook well. She forced us to have lunch there (I know it sounds incredible). We still praised her cooking but we knew the meal was not so good. We understood her hospitality and kindness therefore we chose to tell a white lie.

Chinese people prefer to hold together or corporate with each other when they are doing something but western people choose to be independent. In the picture, there’s one western guy stand in the left side and a lot of Chinese guys hand in hands stand at the right side. That’s the reason why the whole members of families (nearly 40 people) will get together during the New Years Eve. The more people come, the less lonely they feel. Moreover, Chinese love to sit together in one table so that we can look after everyone. In my school dining hall, the tables where the Chinese kids sit so often have lots of extra chairs pulled up to them.

There’s one more fun fact shows that Western people always take shower in the morning and Chinese people always do that at night.One of Chinese friends asked me why most of the Americans love to take shower in the morning. Actually I just know that I take shower at night because my parents takes shower at night. My mom takes shower at night because her mom takes shower at night…..I ask my american roommate why he takes shower every morning, he said because he want to have a nice and clean face to see people in a new day.

After reading my essay, I think people may have some general ideas about how cultures affect people’s behaviors. And if you find that those things really interested you, go to find some resource online or talk to a person who has different culture.