Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[m1s57]

I'm a Japanese student. I go to a university.
I have some friends who came from China. They are kind and have a good thinking. I like them very much.
But I think they are sometimes too honest. For example, my friend who gets fat, they say "Recently, you get fat, don't you? You should lose weight right now! " to her even she cares about that. I was surprised. Of course she looked down.
Surely, what they said is true. However, they could say more softly. If they have said softly, she wasn't hurt.
Is honest always good thing?
I don't think so...

[ClarissaMach]

I get what you mean. Maybe it�s a cultural question, but in fact it seems that Chinese usually are very direct and sincere about everything.

Recently I began to look for Mandarin courses in Rio de Janeiro, the city where I live in Brazil. I phoned one of the courses and asked for information about the course (methodology, schedule, costs, etc).

When the woman who received my call told me how much the course would cost, I asked her if I could have any discount since I work for Petrobras (Petrobras is a Brazilian oil company that has partnerships with several educational institutions, in order to allow it�s workers to keep studying). She reacted in a very rude manner, telling me they would give no one no discount. She seemed to be offended!

Well, it�s probably a cultural difference, but the fact is that we �cariocas� are used to ask for discounts over everything. It�s a so common habit that one of the most common marketing strategies used by companies is selling products for prices higher than it should be, allowing costumers to negotiate for discounts (we even have a word for this: �barganhar�. Is there a word for this in your native language?).

Another common rule among us when it comes to commerce is that �the costumer is always right�. A seller will always treat his/her costumer with all the kindness. That was not the case in that occasion...

Well, maybe I just happened to talk to the wrong person. Let�s wait and see if any of the Chinese friends we have in this forum will talk on behalf of their people.
_________________
Stormy Weather.

[Bob S.]

[beancurdturtle]

Funny thing about Chinese. Sometimes their persuasive conversation is very direct. It's usually when they care about you or feel familiar with you.

They feel comfortable enough that maybe they can shock you into action - and that your friendship will survive in any case. If they didn't care they wouldn't be so direct.

Where Japanese persuasive conversation is very subtle and relies upon influence and suggestion.

It's quite interesting - and quite confusing to Westerners that don't know the cultural differences.
_________________
Daniel

�Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.�
--Dr. Seuss

[RedRose]

Last week, my co-worker met me on some supermarket, and she saw me holding some pork and fish in my basket, then she said:"God, you must have put a lot of holiday weight! but you are even gonna buy a lot of meat!! come on! time to lose your extra weight! throw the meat back to the shelf!"

At that time, I didn't feel bad. actually, when she said that, she didn't mean to hurt me or mock me anyway, she was showing her concern on me. instead, I think she was so nice at that time.

Yes, maybe this is about different cultural background. in China, such an advice is reasonable and acceptable.

[ad-miral]

Chinese are the most dishonest people in the whole world, take me as an example
_________________
If I say "I love you" to someone, then I also have to say "I also love everyone else inside you, I love the whole world because of you, I also love myself inside you." -- Erich Fromm, the Art of Love

[beancurdturtle]

[RedRose]

XW, you are definitely nuts.

and Turtle, your smiley is scary

[MarkBeth]

ad-miral wrote:
chinese are the most dishonest people in the whole world?

why do you say that?
i am a chinese.as a chinese ,i'm so moving.My motherland is one of the longest hostory countries.Her people work very hardly,and they are very kind ,if you don't know chinese proundly ,please don't say that .ok?

[RedRose]

Markbeth, it has been just 3 days since you registered here. so you probably don't know Admiral's writing style.

actually, Admiral was joking when he said that.

[MarkBeth]

RedRose ,thank you for pointing my error.it is really that our culture diffrent from America's.I see ,and I will noticed next time.(RedRose,不知道我上面写的有没有错,我的意思是我有没有用错单词).Thank you ,RedRose.

[ad-miral]

Many German people, if they think that you are weak and you can't protect yourself with words very much, then they begin to think they are the best and they bully you a lot.
For example I have a secretary, because I'm only doing practise at their company, she thinks she can reduce my wages and treat me as a cheap worker etc. But she is not intelligent so she can't tell anything about my working skills so she can only force me to come at 7 o'clock in the morning. So if I sleep earlier and I go at 7 o'clock she can't do anything.
That's an example why Westerners are very honest, because they only think of themselves and they only know: If I don't like this boy, I have to force him to come to work early.

But Chinese people are different. They know social skills better than German guys, so they know what to say in which situations. They put a very nice smile on their face but you don't know what they really think. Are they fooling me, or not?
If my secretary was a Chinese, I think she would make good friends with many of my bosses, and tell them not to tell me anything about new projects, so I would know nothing and I will get fired soon.
That's why Chinese are dishonest, because they also think: I always should behave kindly, both to good people and to bad people. You know, Chinese can do such a thing called 笑里藏刀 and Westerners can't.

edit: I was not joking
_________________
If I say "I love you" to someone, then I also have to say "I also love everyone else inside you, I love the whole world because of you, I also love myself inside you." -- Erich Fromm, the Art of Love

[RedRose]

[beancurdturtle]

[BourneNOIR]