Korean Job Discussion Forums

[jajdude]

Not bad to consider for anyone in any foreign country: a lot of psychological stuff.
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author: Orrin
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The following piece has been kicking around on my hard drive for a few years, and this seems like an appropriate place to post it. I can't take credit for authoring it, although I wish I could. My apologies to the unknown author.

Teachers generally arrive in China filled with goodwill and eager to make friends with Chinese people. All too often, however, by the time a few months have passed some of the gleam has rubbed off this enthusiasm and benevolence. You find yourself complaining more, a little more likely to find fault with individual Chinese, a little more likely to grumble about "the Chinese" as if the entire nation was collectively responsible for whatever little misfortune you experienced today. What has happened?

Usually this change is accounted for less by a change in your philosophical outlook than by the bumps and scrapes that occur as your good intentions encounter life in China. Not that all of these encounters are bad. Some will be unambiguously pleasant, and these will encourage your good feelings about China and its people. Other encounters, however, will be indisputably nasty, and push your feelings toward China in less cheerful directions. However, ultimately your view of China will probably be shaped most by how you interpret the many ambiguous encounters that fall in the grey area in the middle, encounters where you aren't quite sure why a Chinese person said or did something puzzling or unsettling.

If your "default directory" is interpreting these encounters negatively, you will pile up grievances against China relatively rapidly, and it will be more difficult for you to maintain a good attitude toward China. If, on the other hand, you tend to view encounters in the most positive light possible, your view of China will suffer less wear and tear. In other words, your ability to preserve a good attitude toward China and its people will depend to a large extent on whether after problematic encounters you habitually assume Chinese people to be guilty or innocent.

This article is not an invitation to rosy-eyed unrealism in judging cross-cultural encounters. Rather, it is intended to offer a little insight as to the dynamics that affect you as you interact with Chinese, some suggestions as to how you can deal with cross-cultural encounters more positively, and a plea that you try to give the benefit of the doubt when possible. Below I will argue that an effective cross-cultural communicator is one who:

� Is aware of his/her expectations and feelings when interacting with a "stranger", and is aware of how these may shape his/her interpretation of what the stranger says or does.
� Tries to suspend or delay interpretation in cross-cultural encounters rather than drawing hasty conclusions.
� Looks for a range of possible interpretations when a stranger does or says something unexpected, puzzling, or unpleasant.
� When possible, tends to give the stranger reasonable benefit of the doubt.
� Responds to encounters, especially problematic ones, in ways which facilitate learning and increase understanding.

Below, let's look at the dynamics of cross-cultural interaction and the importance of each of these attributes through the case of a young Western woman who has just arrived in China.

A Situation
Jane Doe, a young Western woman, has just arrived in China and is now taking a taxi from the airport to the school where she will teach, in the suburbs of the city. When the taxi stops the meter reading is 32.50 yuan, but the taxi driver turns to her and in flawed but intelligible English asks for 50! Understandably feeling somewhat at a loss -- and a bit intimidated -- Jane tries to decide whether to argue with the driver or just pay him what he asks, and she is already wondering if Chinese are all scoundrels and thieves.

Quite naturally, Jane assumes that she is being cheated, and she may well be correct. However, there may also be more to the situation than meets the eye, and upon reflection we can see a number of other possibilities. Perhaps taxi fares go up outside the city limits. Perhaps there is a standard extra charge for luggage, bridges and tunnels, or a holiday. Perhaps the taxi fares have recently been raised but the meter has not yet been adjusted. Perhaps she misunderstood what he said. However, in the pressure of the situation it may not occur to Jane that there are alternative explanations for this apparent act of piracy, and whether the driver is actually trying to swindle her or not, Jane may well leave the taxi assuming that she has been cheated.

The most unfortunate consequence of this little tale is probably not the few yuan of which Jane may have been unlawfully deprived. More unfortunate is the fact that she has accumulated her first grievance, and that a few such encounters may make a significant impact on her views toward Chinese and their culture. And sadly this may be entirely due to a misunderstanding on Jane's part.

Let's pause for a moment to notice that in the little story above Jane never found out what the taxi driver's intentions really were -- it is like a frustrating modern novel that ends without really ending, leaving you suspended in the air to figure out the ending for yourself. This is intentional. In cross-cultural encounters we often never find out what was really going on in the mind and heart of the stranger, so we are left to judge for ourselves what we think their thoughts and intentions might have been. The lessons that we draw from cross-cultural encounters are shaped in large part by what happens in our own minds, and the habitual ways in which we think about these encounters are thus a very important part of determining both what we will come to believe about strangers and how we will feel about them.

Little incidents like the one described above might seem relatively inconsequential -- after all, even if the taxi driver is trying to cheat Jane, the difference in cost is only 17.50, not an earthshaking sum. However, such incidents often have an impact that goes beyond their material consequences, in part because of their emotional intensity. A real-life experience of being cheated by a flesh and blood Chinese will tend to shape the views of a foreign visitor much more than listening to what others say about Chinese. Also, people have a strong tendency to learn about other cultures by generalizing on the basis of specific experiences, "war stories" which illustrate the virtues and vices of the people of other cultures. Just as people tend to remember the specific anecdotes and examples in a lecture or sermon better than they remember the expository content surrounding it, people tend to think in terms of specific stories from which they generalize broader truths about a culture and its people, and it often only takes a few unpleasant experiences to form the basis for a substantial set of negative generalizations and to undermine our goodwill. Thus, for Jane and other foreigners the tragedy of incidents like the taxi episode above is not just the material loss, but that they leave the taxi having collected their first war story about perfidious Chinese.

Let us now go back over the episode a little more slowly and carefully, asking the question why it is that cross-cultural encounters have a natural tendency to go awry, often leaving both parties with a dimmer view of each other as individuals and groups. We will also consider the question of what can and should be done to deal with cross-cultural encounters in ways that will increase the chances of understanding and minimize the likelihood of conflict.

#1: Being Aware Of Expectations And Feelings:
One problem in Jane's encounter was that being on unfamiliar turf, interacting with a stranger in a foreign land probably caused her to feel less at ease than usual. Her discomfort was then compounded when she was caught by surprise; she no doubt expected to pay the price on the meter B or at least something close to it -- rather than the substantially higher fare the driver asked for. While Jane's expectation was not unreasonable, its violation had the effect of putting her on guard and making her defensive. These feelings set the stage for negative interpretation of the driver's behavior.

Uncertainty:
One of the most salient characteristics of cross-cultural encounters is uncertainty. When dealing with people of our own cultural background, we can generally predict with a fair degree of accuracy what they are likely to do and say because we are playing by more or less the same rules they are. However, when we interact with strangers we soon discover that the patterns of behavior and communication which were familiar to us have disappeared. We find that we can't read all the cues strangers transmit, that they don't behave according to all of our rules and norms, and that our ability to predict and control the interaction has dramatically decreased. This, in turn, causes us to feel stress and anxiety, makes us more cautious and defensive, and reduces our willingness to trust the strangers we encounter.

Using a foreign language:
Uncertainty is compounded by the fact that in most cross-cultural encounters, at least one of the participants is speaking a language that is not his/her own; in fact, both participants may be trying to negotiate a slippery communication situation using a language of which their control is at best unsteady. Anyone who has ever tried to learn a foreign language knows how uncomfortable and self-conscious people can be when trying to communicate in a new and unfamiliar language, and these feelings add stress to cross-cultural encounters. Speaking a foreign language is also very fatiguing, which further exacerbates feelings of uncertainty. All this further inclines people to be less easygoing and generous than they might be in situations where they were surer of their control.

Expectations:
When we interact with people whose culture is unfamiliar to us, some of the things they do will almost inevitably violate our expectations - i.e. surprise us. Some of these surprises are harmless or even delightful, but on the whole the experience of being caught by surprise tends to be more unsettling than enjoyable. Even something as harmless as laughter can be unsettling if a stranger suddenly breaks out laughing when we do not expect it -- it may leave us wondering whether we said or did something wrong, and certainly reminds us that we are not in full control of the situation. When our expectations are violated, our sense of confidence tends to evaporate, to be replaced with a sense of confusion and uncertainty and an awareness that we no longer know what is going on. This lack of certainty predisposes us to judge unexpected or puzzling behavior in a negative light.

#2: Suspending or Delaying Judgment

When the driver turned to Jane and announced that he wanted 50 yuan, Jane had to quickly size up the situation in order to decide how to respond. Obviously her decision as to whether to argue, gently ask for an explanation, just give him the money, or fling the door open and run will be based on her interpretation of what is happening. If she decides the problem is a misunderstanding her response will be quite different than if she thinks the driver's intent is malicious.

In Jane's situation, she was forced to interpret the behavior of the driver because she had to decide how to respond, but even in situations where we don't have to respond immediately to what a stranger does or says, we still have a powerful drive to try to make sense of the situation -- both during and after the encounter. In part this drive to interpret is probably based in an instinctive human desire to evaluate. For example, after people engage in almost any activity -- seeing a movie, listening to a talk, going out for a meal, whatever -- the most natural question seems to be "How was it?" In cross-cultural encounters, this impulse toward evaluation is often manifested as deciding whether the stranger was basically well intentioned toward you or not -- friendly, neutral or hostile.

However, there is also a deeper need to understand the behavior of strangers so that we can reduce the amount of uncertainty in cross-cultural encounters; without this sense that we understand situations, we feel uncomfortable and out of control. When confronted with a puzzling situation, we are like swimmers who have been engulfed by a huge wave and are being tumbled about under water -- our first desire is to get our bearings and try to figure out which way is up. Thus, in a cross-cultural encounter we want to reduce uncertainty by getting a handle on what the strangers' intentions are and by figuring out why they are doing what they are doing. Once we understand what is happening in an encounter -- or once we think we understand -- we feel more at ease and better able to cope.

This human tendency to understand why other people do what they do is not all bad. In fact, experts suggest that one of the most valuable strategies for adjusting to life in a new culture is looking for sense and reason behind the new behaviors around us, the idea being that it is much easier to accept behavior which makes sense to us -- even if it is governed by a logic quite foreign to our own -- than behavior that seems completely irrational.

However, this drive to interpret and judge is problematic in cross-cultural encounters because we often know so little about the situation and the strangers we are judging. This lack of knowledge leaves us prone to making interpretations which are premature and inaccurate, and which do more to foul communication and understanding than to facilitate them. Furthermore, once we have arrived at an interpretation of the stranger's behavior, we tend to stop looking for alternative interpretations of that behavior. This is significant because it means that once we arrive at an interpretation of the behavior of a stranger, the case is generally closed, and no matter how poor our understanding of the situation was, our premature judgment becomes engraved in stone.

Because our drive to interpret often leads us to premature and inaccurate judgments, a desirable quality in cross-cultural communicators is the ability to suspend judgment or at least delay judgment until we have an adequate understanding of the situation. Of course, in some situations we must react quickly and don't have the luxury of suspending judgment, but in many cross-cultural encounters it is possible to delay judgment at least for awhile as we try to gain a better understanding; and after an encounter we always have the option of looking back at it and trying to understand it better.

One reason we don't interpret more carefully is that our interpretation process is so automatic and instinctive we are often not even aware of it. When we react to strangers in intercultural encounters, it is not unusual for us to make little distinction between our description of a situation (the visible facts), our interpretation of it (our explanation of why it is so) and our evaluation of it (whether we like it or not). If we are to learn to slow or suspend the drive to interpret, the first important step is simply to become consciously aware that we are interpreting.

The second step toward better control over our drive to interpret is learning to step back from our judgments and look at them critically. Part of the problem in cross-cultural encounters is that the territory is so unfamiliar; hence there is a high likelihood that we will misread signals and come to conclusions that are partially or totally inaccurate. Our ability to understand encounters and learn from them is therefore enhanced if we can learn to view our interpretations of strangers' behavior as lightly held "working hypotheses" rather than as firm eternal conclusions. If we can treat our judgments as preliminary theories to be re-examined and refined as new information becomes available, we are less likely to fall into the trap of having our understanding controlled by premature judgments.

A third strategy for gaining better control of our impulse to interpret situations and people involves cultivating the habit of consciously looking for multiple possible interpretations of encounters. In many problematic cross-cultural encounters, there are a range of interpretations which fall within the realm of the possible, and by forcing ourselves to consider more than one of these, we remind ourselves of the tentative nature of whatever conclusion we arrived at. In an election in which there are several candidates, you are more vividly aware of the existence of alternatives -- and the possibility that you made the wrong choice -- than in an election in which there was only a single candidate. Thus the very process of considering alternatives is likely to slow our rush to judgment and also cause us to hold our conclusions less firmly.

#3: Empathy in interpretation

Another reason we have a strong tendency to judge the behavior of strangers negatively arises from "ethnocentrism", i.e. our tendency to judge other cultures and people of other cultures on the basis of the norms and practices of our own culture. This tendency is very deeply rooted because we learn at a very young age to see our approach to life as being the "normal" one, and this assumption that our way of doing things is right is so deeply buried in our minds that we are generally not even consciously aware of it. Obviously, if we use our own culture as the standard by which to judge other cultures, there is a strong assumption that our culture is superior, and a strong negative bias in the way we view other cultures. As Samovar and Porter note, "Feelings that we are right and they are wrong pervade every aspect of a culture's existence." In fact, because of this tendency to view other cultures negatively, many scholars feel that ethnocentrism may be the single most significant barrier to intercultural communication.

If we are to grow in our ability to understand people of other cultures, we need to move away from an ethnocentric viewpoint and attempt to see the world from the other side, in other words, to develop empathy for the stranger's viewpoint. As Bennett notes: "Central to any intercultural communication skill is the ability to experience some aspect of reality differently from what is 'given' by one's own culture.....Empathy...describes an attempt to understand by imagining or comprehending the other's perspective" (Bennett 1993: 53). Of course in cross-cultural encounters we cannot suddenly see the world from someone else's viewpoint simply by wishing it; learning another culture and its outlook on life requires considerable expenditure of time and effort. However, as Bennett suggests, empathy toward other viewpoints is in large part an attitude of willingness to at least try moving beyond our own cultural framework, and that is within our power to control.

Again, part of the key to developing and maintaining this openness lies in learning to disarm our automatic judgment mechanism long enough for us to at least look for alternative perspectives. If we fly solely by instinct in a cross-cultural encounter, our first interpretation is likely to be one which is based on the standard our own culture and norms. Put bluntly, our first impulse is to measure the behavior of the stranger by the norms of our own culture and then be suspicious of any deviation from that norm. If we are to seek another perspective, we need to move beyond this initial ethnocentric interpretation and consider other possibilities.

As a practical matter, the best way to do this is probably to first recognize our instinctive judgment (which may, after all, be correct), but then push ourselves to look for other interpretations which are less obvious. This not only causes us to delay judgment, but also pushes us to keep searching and trying to improve our understanding. In an unfamiliar setting there is no guarantee that this additional effort to understand will rapidly lead us to the correct interpretation of a stranger's words or actions, and there will no doubt be situations and encounters which we never fully understand. However, by casting our net more broadly there is a greater chance that we will arrive at an understanding of the situation which at least roughly corresponds with that of the stranger; perhaps even more important, our minds are more likely to remain open to new understandings as we learn more about the situation. A conscious attempt to consider alternatives may not always lead us to an accurate understanding, but it is a far more promising approach than shutting down our data processing systems as soon as the first ethnocentric judgment occurs to us.

#4: Countering Negative Bias and Generosity In Interpretation:
In the case of Jane and the taxi driver, there are some very good reasons why Jane might be suspicious of his behavior. However, even in cross-cultural encounters that are less fraught with the possibility of mischief, we still have a strong tendency to err on the side of distrust when interpreting strangers' behavior.

In-groups and out-groups: Some of the reasons for this tendency to judge strangers negatively - ethnocentrism, uncertainty, and so forth - have been suggested above. An additional reason we tend to judge strangers negatively lies in the basic tribal impulse to view the people as falling into in-groups and out-groups: "us" and "them." Our in-group consists of people with whom we share a common identity of some kind, and we tend to have relatively positive feelings and a greater degree of responsibility toward members of our in-group. Granted, in-groups have flexible lines, and who exactly is included varies according to the situation. However, in cross-cultural encounters, strangers are virtually always viewed as the out-group - "them." These are people with whom we don't have any shared sense of identity, so we tend to feel a greater sense of distance from them. We also tend to trust them less and judge them more harshly. In cases like that of Jane above, this tendency does not necessarily mean that she will always take a hostile view of strangers, but it lurks in the background waiting to emerge when an encounter doesn't seem to be going well.

Culture shock:
If one of the participants in an encounter is a sojourner in the other's country, another factor which sometimes influences cross-cultural encounters is "culture shock" or "culture fatigue." Sojourners who leave their homes for an experience in another culture are not usually ill-tempered misfits looking for insult and abuse behind every puzzling encounter with a foreigner; in fact, many start out with an abundance of good will and a desire to see the best in strangers, inclined to interpret differences between themselves and strangers as interesting or quaint rather than as evidence that strangers are hostile or evil. However, adapting to life in a new culture can be a very draining experience.
Sojourners have left behind many of their sources of support and emotional refreshment behind, be these family, friends, favorite pastimes, accustomed jobs or duties, or just familiar surroundings. Then in the new culture they face unusual demands on their energy as they try to learn a new language, culture, and way of life, all in a world in which even basic beliefs and assumptions once taken for granted are constantly challenged. All of this effort can take a substantial toll on a sojourner's reserves of mental and emotional energy, and the resulting culture fatigue often results in impatience and irritability, withdrawal into the in-group community, and a tendency to view the host culture out-group community more negatively -- even with outright hostility.

Unfortunately, our natural tendency to judge the behavior of strangers - "them" - negatively often has consequences that go beyond our judgment of one individual's actions. Perhaps the saddest outcome of Jane's encounter with the Chinese taxi driver is that her feeling of annoyance may not long stay neatly confined to one individual cabbie. As Jane later recounts this incident to sympathetic Western friends, it is not at all unlikely that the offending taxi driver will come to stand for all Chinese taxi drivers, or perhaps even Chinese people in general. This results from a natural human tendency to view strangers in vague, over-generalized terms in broad categories such as "Asian", "African" and so forth, and to assume that everyone who belongs in one of these categories is more or less the same as everyone else.

As people think about encounters with strangers and discuss them with others, there is a strong tendency to treat encounters as typical incidents which reflect some deeper underlying truth about Koreans, French, or whatever group might be involved. Encounters thus have an important impact on how we think about people of the other cultures not only because the encounters themselves are so intense, but also because we have a tendency to generalize and even universalize the judgments we reach.

If we accept the idea that a goal in cross-cultural encounters is to minimize conflict and bad feeling, we need to take conscious steps to counter-balance our tendency to judge strangers negatively, in part so that the encounters themselves are smoother, and in part because this will result in a smaller accumulation of grievance stories and less wear and tear on our attitudes toward strangers. Here it is important to remember that in encounter situations we will often never know the full story of what was going on in the minds and hearts of the strangers we met, and that the issue is therefore not simply one of determining facts and interpreting encounters correctly. Imagine ourselves as mentally labeling encounters and strangers and then filing them in either the "good" or "bad" category.

Which category winds up having more cases will depend heavily on where we habitually file the large number of unsolved cases; if our default directory is to assume that the strangers are innocent unless proven guilty, we will have a much smaller file of grievances than if we make the opposite assumption. Assuming that it is important for us to maintain as healthy and positive an attitude toward strangers and their cultures as possible, it makes sense for us to give strangers the benefit of the doubt in unclear situations.

Clearly we need to avoid an extreme where we always view strangers and their intentions as being benign even when there is strong evidence to the contrary. There are plenty of evil people in the world, and we do not wish to deprive ourselves of the protection of common sense. The goal is rather to keep our load of grievances from being heavier than necessary. Encounters with strangers are a wonderful opportunity to experience a new world of ideas and people, and it is a tragedy when half-imagined grievances dampen our interest in exploring this opportunity or sour our attitudes toward strangers and their culture.

#5: Responding In Ways That Facilitate Learning:

Why shouldn't Jane just hand the driver 32.50, jump out of the cab, and then slam the door? This strategy does have advantages -- it will probably save Jane 17.50 (assuming she doesn't get chased by a policeman and forced to pay some kind of fine). However, this response also has a price -- Jane won't really learn anything. This is not to say that Jane will draw no conclusions from her experience; as we have seen above it is very likely that she will learn a lesson from the experience and pass that lesson on to any friend who is willing to listen -- Don't trust Chinese taxi drivers! However, this lesson is not learned as much as it is imagined. If Jane follows this strategy, she will know no more about what happened when she slams the taxi door than she did when the incident started.

An alternative response, such as asking they driver to explain the discrepancy between the fee on the meter and the one he charged -- or even pointing at the meter and looking confused -- has two significant advantages. The first is that it delays judgment of the situation for at least a moment so that Jane can think about the situation rather than responding on the basis of primal self-preservation instinct. Even this brief pause will probably be enough to allow her to remind herself that she doesn't yet have all the facts of the case.

The second advantage of this strategy is that she may learn more about what is happening before she has to judge and respond. This gives the driver a chance to explain aspects of the situation Jane may not be aware of (extra charges for luggage, for example). It also gives him a chance to produce evidence for his claims (some kind of printed schedule of fees). Also, as he tries to explain, Jane has more of a chance to assess the way the driver talks and acts so that she has a little bit more evidence to use in making up her mind as to whether he is lying or not.

Finally, if Jane understands his explanation she can later check it out with other Chinese to have it verified or discredited. This last possibility is especially important because even if the driver turns out to have been lying she will learn it from a Chinese person who will probably be sympathetic to her -- and whose sympathy will be a reminder that not all Chinese are out to get her.

Of course in cross-cultural encounters it is not always possible to ask the stranger to explain everything he/she does or says, not least because there will often be a language barrier. However, when considering possible responses to encounter situations, strategies which allow us to learn more about the encounter are generally preferable to those that don't.

Conclusion

So, one final time, let's review the strategies that will help you more effective deal with cross-cultural encounters in China:

1) Be aware of your expectations and feelings. If you are not, they may well predispose you to unnecessarily negative interpretations of encounters with Chinese.

2) Suspend or delay judgment when possible. Hasty judgment is often inaccurate judgment, and leads to misunderstanding.

3) Try to see the situation from different perspectives, especially those of the people with whom you are interacting. This will not only help you see others with more empathy, but also naturally put the brakes on your natural rush to judgment.

4) As much as possible, give strangers the benefit of the doubt. There are many dynamics in cross-cultural encounters which will tend to push you to judge negatively, so counteract these with a conscious attempt to be generous in your interpretations.

5) Attempt to learn from puzzling encounters, even after they are over. Quick guilty verdicts are the most dangerous when there is no opportunity for appeal and review.

To reiterate, these strategies are not intended as tricks with which you can whitewash nasty experiences. Sin exists in China just as it does in any other country, and we would be fooling ourselves if we tried to find a benign interpretation of every unpleasant thing we hear or experience in China. These strategies are intended, rather, to ensure that we don't find fault where it doesn't exist, and that we don't subject our attitudes to an unnecessary load of imagined grievances. The conscious use of the strategies above will do much to ensure that you are able to maintain a more positive attitude as you go through the learning process necessary to really understand China, its people, and its culture. The difficult encounters are only part of the story, and we want to maintain open minds so that we are ready to see and appreciate the many delightful encounters that also await us in China.

[Tiger Beer]

Interesting. Jajdude, do you feel there are a lot of similaties of the CHINA experience to the KOREA experience?

Whenever I read things on the CHINA Forums, it almost seems like an identical world to people's greivances, stories, etc. on the KOREA Forums.

I'd think China would be similar except for the extra element of it being financially hungry for foreigner's coins in their pocket. That element added onto a very Korea-like element, could be a tipping point for some. (The taxi story above being a case in point). At least in Korea, we know the majority of Koreans don't rip-off foreigners in most circumstances.

Anyways, curious if you are observing many similarities to being new to China with what it was once like being new to Korea?

[seoulsister]

Where is the China off-topic forum? I can only find the job-related one...

[jajdude]

[D.D.]

I loved China but would never think that there was any other reason for the extra money other than being scammed. Actually sticking up for yourself there earns you respect and you don't end up carrying a grudge.

The ones who hate China are the ones who let themselves get ripped off then bitch about it all the time.

I looked at China like a game and it taught be to stick up for myself and not take things personally.

Korea on the other hand?

[VanIslander]

I'd pay what's on the meter... with a smile

If the driver pressed the matter I'd point at the meter and in a firm but friendly and matter-of-factly attitude say there, I paid that. Have a good day. And smile again.

Assume the meter is broken or rates have gone up? uh... that's just silly! Anyone who has travelled much would find that thought absurd.

Assume the driver is trying to make a few extra bucks off the foreigner? Why not? No need to get angry about it! It's cultural. Treat it as a matter of fact situation.

Suspend judgement? In a way, yes, asking other locals about the experience later and see what they have to say about it: do taxis charge them above and beyond the meter fare?... but in the meantime, in the moment, go with your gut but don't take it personal! That's what I do. The driver doesn't know me. Should I assume I am being charged more because I'm a foreigner? Perhaps not, but it's hard to have reasonable doubt in the situation, takes quite a conscious effort to suspend judgement in the moment. (I have paid extra in a similar situation and chalked it up to inexperience, a sort of newbie tax, as I neither spoke the language nor researched the culture enough to know what to expect in that situation.)

The intentions of the driver? Well, on the one hand it's very easy crossculturally to assess whether someone is friendly or hostile, that kind of thing is often communicated nonverbally and the signals can be often hard to mistake. On the other hand, I wouldn't care what the intentions are when in the practical situation: what matters is being charged more than what's on the meter. Why is that? How the driver feels is beside the point.

And after all is said and done, whether one is pleasant or annoyed int he moment, of course one should try not to overgeneralize from one's experience, instead: to limit prejudice, that goes in all walks of life.

[GreenlightmeansGO]

I read some of the post and then noticed how long it was, so I will read it later.

Just a little bit of a similar story, I was once charged W10 000 for a trip that should've cost W5 000 (I was drunk). I gave the driver W10 000, waited for my change, but none ever came

[Hanson]

Great read - thanks for posting it, but Aye Caramba that was repetitive.