Social Courtesy & Behavior

I have been annoyed for a long time by some of ungracious phone calls everyday in office. I usually introduce myself first in a soft, lower voice when making phone calls, then tell the person at the other end what the purpose I am calling for, or who I am looking for. However, I often receive phone calls begin with: “Who are you?” in an impatient tone. See, he/she is calling me and yet he/she is asking who I am!

I feel upset also whenever reading articles concerning Chinese tourists’ bad behaviors abroad, such as spiting / littering everywhere; smoking in non-smoking area; unpunctuality – sometimes all the tourists in a bus waiting for one person who will show no regret at all; especially the world famous noises Chinese people made. There is a saying that wherever there are Chinese there are loud noises. We usually talk too loudly in public places like tourist attractions, airport departure lounge, shops, restaurants, buses, subways, … and totally neglect other people’s existence. In such environment we have to, sometimes, raise our voices and it make the situation worse. It is a vicious circle.

Personally, I feel such indelicate and improper behaviors are deeply rooted on Chinese people’s self-importance and neglect of other people’s feelings.

[此贴子已经被作者于2005-9-30 13:59:06编辑过]

Dear Jeannie,

I can fully understand how bad you feel about those indelicate and improper bahaviours that have been rampant in China long, since I myself have seen with my own eyes a great many of fellow countrymen so unsightly spit on the clean and smooth surface of the road during a heavy traffic. Sometimes if you hear them do so, it is as if they were vomitting the undigested with an unbearable stomachache.The twisted loud noise they made may have already sent you onto another side of the road,sick with nausea; you feel disgusted as well as humiliated.

Though there are quite a number of other bad bahaviours such careless and ungracious people do, such as smoking in public or litrering or else, I think, merely free spitting on the street is such an issue deep enough for most of us---the really cultured and educated people to think over.

Last month, as far as I can remember, I was having some fun on a Yahoo international chatroom online with quite a bunch of foreign friends there with whom I could practice my modest English when I suddenly saw on the screen words from an overseas student then currently learning Chinese in China, saying Chinese people not only spit everywhere without care,but also pee like barbarians on the bus(Well, I am not here to raise or provoke any racial issue here but just to focus on the very topic concerning spitting in China, and the nationality of the foreign student will not be disclosed by all means)). I was infuriated. I directly pointed out what he said was nonsense, warning him that he had to prove whatever he said about Chinese people if it was true. Of course, like any other insignificant quarrel online, it ended up with nothing but more misunderstadning towards each other. However, the spitting issue which had given rise to this very unpleasant encounter made me so unforgetful of what a distorted image those spitters could pose for our country before the whole world.

While I was teaching English at my university, I often seized every chance I could to tell my students never spit randomly on campus or in the classroom, suggesting to take with them paper tissues or handkerchiefs when necessary, for I believe,to be educated means not only so intellectually but so behaviouristically. I even once criticised one of my students on the spot in the classroom for his unmindfulness of my advice for he did spit on the ground, in just front of me, in a classroom of more than 30 people! Later on,I could tell he was not feeling at ease during the folowing 2 hour class and must have held a slight grudge against me for some time (So I guess.). But since then I have never seen a sigle student of mine ever doing it again. I knew sometimes we had to point out their misbahaviour with some kind of punishment. For some, it could be a moment embarrassment; for some, it could be a proportionate fine as an extra payment for the road cleaners. There may be other wiser ways but anyway those who spit with a public respect shall by all means be punishable.

The more terrible thing is when you,as a younger person, see an elderly nearby spit just at the roadside. What a bad example! Our children would also take this ugly habit for granted and think it natural to do so. And the most terrible, they learn to do so.

Just a couple days ago, I too read from China Daily a piece of news concerning this humiliating issue: Many ofthose turists from across our country to Beijing to spend their national day holiday there were seen spitting at the Tian'men Square, with quite a few foreigners there! No wonder we Chinese people would occasionally be so unfairly prejudiced against by people from abroad---the whole magnificent picture of a vast nation with a 5000 year civilization was tainted by those small specks of spit. We will and have to wipe those dirty spots out!

Charlie

[此贴子已经被作者于2005-10-7 14:15:51编辑过]

It is a true story.

A world noted Chinese oil painter has been invited to be a doctorate tutor of a Fine Arts Academy after living abroad over 20 years. Stepped out of the airplane onto the land of his hometown Shanghai he hesitated for a while, as if unsure of where he was.

As the car was driving along the bustling and flourishing streets in downtown, it was as if driving into the sea of twinkling and glittering neon lights and the sea of well dressed and preserved people. He looked around, stared out of the car window, amazed at the great changes that have happened over the years and signed with emotion: “Oh, it is beyond my wildest hopes!”

Suddenly the car stopped. What he witnessed next was enough to bring him back to the earth. Two cars in front of him were rear-ended and then the drivers from both cars were getting off and started fighting each other and were totally regardless of the traffic in rush hour.

At this very moment the painter was completely sobered where he was and signed: “My dear motherland, I am back!”

Alas!

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[此贴子已经被作者于2005-12-28 13:09:29编辑过]