This is China* – Brace Yourself
Preface
Monday, June 28, 2010
Welcome to Shanghai and the World Expo 2010. Brace yourself for the unexpected.
If you are a first time visitor you are going to be shocked by the scope and the grandeur of this amazing city. Shanghai will soon show itself to you as one of the World’s great cities. As stated in the new Urbanatomy Shanghai World Expo Guide 2010, “ Shanghai is a dynamic metropolis whose most precious heritage is modernity… it and the World Expo exhausts superlatives. Set in the most populous city in the world’s most populous
Country, this Expo is the most expensive in history, covering the largest, attracting the most participants, and drawing the largest number of visitors.”
Yet, in spite of (or I should say, in addition to) the many strides the city has taken, it retains its unique traditions and elements of its thousand years old culture and social conventions distinctly different from those that you are used to.
We can learn much about ourselves by observing our reactions and analyzing our feelings in new surroundings and foreign circumstances. I have lived the majority of the past eight years in a culture as far from the one of my birth as you can imagine.
In China there is much that fascinates and confuses me. My love affair with the World’s oldest continuous cultural is fraught with misunderstanding requiring constant reflection. I have spent my time here reflecting and writing in my attempt to make sense of the rapidly changing face of a seemingly unchangeable Chinese character and to serve as a mirror for on-going self-discovery.
I have decided to select a few bits of past commentary to provide a guide to behaviors and social conventions that you may find confusing. The idea came to me as I was writing the first in the collection, “You are Here.” Once again I saw something that was done in a way other than my habit. And my question was, “Why do most of the maps posted in the Expo Park not serve their function – directing visitors to their destinations.” Most everyone I asked did not even understand the question let alone have an answer. Without, compromising the story suffice to say that the answer seems to be another unique social convention.
Some of these reflections are 7-8 years old and I have been searching for answers ever since and I don’t have them. What I have gotten is so wrapped up in such a different way of thinking that I remain perplexed.
My purpose is not to add to your confusion but to let you know that what you are about to experience is “normal-” commonplace and not about you and your situation. With a little anticipation you may find these things curious, as I try to do now, and not so frustrating. I hope to help you adjust your expectations and make the most of an enjoyable visit to an amazing city and country.
* “T.I.C” or This is China is the first non-explanation explanation a new arrival receives in China for the curious behaviors he encounters. It is meant to mean, “who know why, it is just the way it is done here in China.”
Although city fathers have expended considerable resources to “civilize” (their term, meaning: “removing any civic embarrassment which present an impression of unsophistication to critical foreign eyes”) their citizens for the many foreign visitors expected, I assure you that these things will surface.
David Sutton
Shanghai, May, 2010
David B. Sutton, former University Professor and President of The Antaeus Organization (TAO), is a human ecologist, biological philosopher, artist and writer with whimsical, evolutionary and earth-centered biases. He is dedicated to life-long learning about the Earth’s essential life-support systems, and the intimate connection between the health of the planet and its people. For over twenty years, he has developed socially and environmentally responsible educational programs and ecological approaches to product design, conservation, sustainable enterprises, and cultural synergy and integral health efforts throughout the world.
He is currently a principal with TaoConsulting in Shanghai, specializing in sustainable design, innovative cross-cultural communications and training. With TaoTravel he leads excursions throughout China’s magnificent Karst country and he is the host of M.A.G.I.C. (Multicultural Activities Generating International Community) Events in Shanghai.
An obdurate dreamer and old-fashion romantic and idealist, he is dedicated to the Taoist practice of the “celestial knight.” He is an active, energetic, enthusiastic person, an avid basketball player and dancer in excellent health.
David B. Sutton 沙乐明, Ph.D is a human ecologist, writer and international consultant specializing in, ecological conservation, sustainable development, integral health and creative communications. He has over twenty-five years experience teaching at the University level. At Stanford University, he lectured on international conservation and development issues and the led the Stanford Alumni Seminar in India and Nepal. He was a principal instructor in the training of trainers for Sweden’s, The Natural Step in the USA.
For the past eight years he has lived and worked in Shanghai where he writes, lectures and is often engaged as a commentator on TV and for workshops and conferences. He was recently featured in the BBC series, “Hot Cities: Counting the Cost” filmed in Shanghai. Dr. Sutton is currently documenting notable examples of sustainable technologies and urban best practices at the World Expo.
THIS IS CHINA
Table of Contents
Preface
Saving Face and the Ring of Gyges
Manufacturing Face: Image over Substance
“You are Here”
I like maps. It is all about feeling in context, I suppose. I want to have an idea where I fit in space. I like History too, it puts you in the context of time and Ecology because I want to know where I fit in the real scheme of things – in the process of life, if you will. These are all good topics for other essays, but here I want to focus on the work of the cartographer – who is supposed to help us orient ourselves within the invisible grids that define our location upon the planet.
I once overheard a couple in the park. They were looking at the posted map of their location. He had just pointed out to her the “You are Here” red dot on the map. Her response was a very puzzled, “How do they know where we are?”
Now, many of you may find this humorous, most likely because you have the reasonable expectation that anybody reading a marked map with a “You Are Here” indication on it must be where the sign is placed to read it and furthermore that the sign is correct and placed in the correct location.
But not so fast. Is this just another “common sense” cultural assumption that we have made ? Well, maybe so! If the “You are Here” signage at recently opened World Expo is any indication there is no attention here to placing a locator map in the correct location, or more precisely orienting it in the right direction. Let me explain.
Here, as every other place in the World, the Chinese follow the universal convention (perhaps obsessively so as you will soon see) that North is at the top of the map, East is to the right, West to the left…etc. So far so good.
Now to properly ‘orient’ yourself on the land you need to have the North of the map facing the North of the land. From there if you want to go east you will know that you need to go right, if west to the left and so far. This is easy enough to do when you have a hand-held map. Just turn (orient) the map and yourself so the map is aligned with your position on the ground.
With a posted map – one that is permanently fixed in position, in order for it to correctly serve its function – to show where you are and which direction you need to go to get someplace else, it needs to be oriented in the same direction as the topography it represents (i.e. North facing North…etc.). And here is where the trouble arises.
All the posted maps here are obsessively fixed with North at the top regardless of which direction they face. This works, of course, when the viewer of the map is truly facing North, but when not – when they and the map they are looking at isn’t (which, by the way, is the majority of the time), the map ceases to be an effective guidance device. In fact, worse, it will send you in the wrong direction.
So here you are at one of the World’s grand events, expecting 70 million visitors over the next six months. Most will soon learn that they need to disregard the posted maps with their “You are Here” indications and doubt as the girl of our young couple did that they really know where you are.
At the Expo it is not that bad, of course. There are thousands of helpful smiling volunteers ready to show you the way and many of the Expo’s structures are impressive, massive land-marks amongst which you can navigate your own way. However, I do wonder how visitors of some remote National Park fare with this method of posted maps and directions.
No Clue of Queue
I have been having the hardest time dealing with the way the Chinese handle a line—or I should say don’t handle them. They have no clue how to deal with a queue and I want to know why.
As a graduate student I remember studying “personal space” and the “stress of social interaction” (e.g. Edward Hall’s “Silent Language”). I learned of the different cultural “comfort zones” – how the psychological space surrounding an individual in which they find themselves at ease is different for different cultures. Here in this international setting, I have become very conscious of how this all plays out. On the dance floor and other public places, for instance, I can almost tell whom I have collided with before seeing them. There are these guys from Finland (of all places) for instance, who can not co-occupy an EMPTY dance floor. On the other hand, my Chinese friends and I are as snug as bugs in a rug on the most crowded dance floor. Asian cultures are renown for their contracted comfort envelope. It is explained as being a consequence of their high density living.
I am thinking now of some of the things I have previously written that make more sense now. The intimate, gentle caress of your head or feet by some complete stranger could be just the natural extension of a “personal space” that permits this kind of ‘intimate touching’. While it could be perceived as a bit threatening to those of more individualistic cultures.
Ok all of this might help to explain how such compact lines can and do form.
But is not giving me any insight into why on earth there is no concern for keeping one’s place in line. Why on earth does a Chinese think it is all right to advance themselves to the front of a long-standing line. Why is it tolerated by others in the line. Why is there no effort on the part of those whose job it is to maintain the line or queue to keep people in their rightful place ?
Three brief examples:
1)The large international airports are very organized here. “Free” luggage carts are available everywhere and when you arrive it is an easy matter to collect your bags and proceed to the very well lined-out Taxi station. There are lines very clearly marked and uniformed guards present. It is impossible NOT to know where the beginning and end of the lines of waiting people are. Forty people waiting in line could be promptly dispatched into the constantly arriving stream of taxis in minutes if order were maintained –BUT IT IS NOT ! Every other (Chinese) person approaching this line of waiting people will walk directly to the front of the line and take the next taxi. And the “guard” will let them. Why? This was getting me so upset one time that I took over traffic control. I stopped every line-breaker in his tracks and sent him back to the end of the line, I stood in the way of any taxi that was about to pick up one of these totally self-absorbed boobs and neglect the many who had been waiting in line. All this as the person, in his very official looking uniform, who was suppose to be doing it watched. This brings me to a second example.
2)At the Bank: Any number of deposit-book holders can be standing in clearly marked teller lines when some raging line-buster cluelessly walks in off the street and breaks for the front. Now the teller knows there is a line waiting for her. She knows that this rabid being has just appeared out of the blue and she says nothing. Nor does anybody else who has been waiting in line. I don’t get it ???
3)My third example is the dumbest of all—dumb because even the clueless self-absorbed soul isn’t benefiting by their incivility. Envision a full elevator—you are descending to the building’s exit, you reach the ground floor, the door opens and those waiting to board INSIST on rushing in before those in the full elevator can exit. What must they be thinking ? Don’t they understand that in order for them to get in we have to get out ???
COULD SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN ALL THIS TO ME ?
At the Expo: Lines at the Expo will make lines waiting for a taxi look like a walk in the park. Long extensive lines will be an inevitable part of the Expo experience. You can expect to stand in lines for up to 2 to 3 hours to enter popular pavilions. A zig-zag network of waiting lines has been very precisely designed with an attendant every 10 meters or so, to organize and control the flow.
This should provide for orderly flow, but I guarantee you, IT WILL NOT! Single file lanes will soon have 3 or 4 abreast jostling for position. It will be particularly acute as you reach the point where the lane makes a 180 degree turn. It is there where many will jockey for the inside position so that they can then begin the next straight away ahead of 10-15 others. During the two hours you wait in line you can expect 50-60 people, who were behind you to start, to be entering before you. What to do ? Well, you will probably do what everybody else does (including the attendants whose job it is to control flow) which is nothing. You after all are a foreign visitor, a guest, what are you to do?
I am Sorry – Thank You
Because of the phrases “I am sorry” and “thank you” we foreigners do not make a very good impression in China. And oddly enough not because we do not say them enough but because we say them too much.
The words “sorry” and “thank you” are two words not easily spoken in Chinese. I don’t mean that the pronunciation is difficult or that they use the notorious “fifth tone.” It is because culturally they are not used nearly as much as in English.
On the other hand, they are just on the tip of our tongue – we relish the moment we can thank someone for a service done or kindness rendered. And apologies come just as quickly. They are the first two things I try to learn when visiting another country. I want people to know that I appreciate what they do for me and I know that I will be making mistake after mistake for which I will want to apologize.
But in China, if you really want to show thanks, the last thing you want to do is to say it out loud. And if you say you are sorry, you are taking the blame for some grand face-losing wrong you have committed.
Theoretically, gratitude is best shown with actions not words. I say theoretically, because although that is the explanation I keep getting, I do not see a lot of gratuitous action here either.
Especially if you are close to someone, thanking them out loud implies that they are not close—it is completely unnecessary. But if you are not close and you want to express your gratitude, what do you do? And once you have expressed your thanks, have you closed the door to ever becoming close?
Saying ‘duibuqi’ (I am sorry) too often is also not recommended either, for while you may be truly sorry for some present transgression saying so seems to give the impression that you harbor some deep shame and guilt for all of your past misdeeds.
So here I am my friends absolutely confused as to how to articulate being a polite, sensitive human being. A hundred times a day I am catching myself from my reflex of “the good manners” my mother worked so hard to teach me.
Could somebody please tell me what to do?
The Simple Pleasures
I have discovered a major public institution here in China—it is the “Barber Shop/Beauty Salon It really is more than that, it’s a place that people (men and women) will touch base every day. I’m thinking that it must be like what the local barber shop was in our early history—the community message board or something like that. This institution thrives on the fact that no body here washes their own hair. That’s what this institution is for the simple pleasure of having somebody run their hands through your hair–a shampoo and head/neck./shoulder massage to get you through the day. Perhaps you can imagine that I have really gotten into this (and you can hold the “what hair” comments). My partner has introduced me to his outlet for such and now I am a card-carrying member of Jiao Jin San Jiao. The card is a pay-in-advance account that entitles you to the equivalent of a dollar haircut and shampoo, a head, neck and shoulder massage for two bucks and an hour and a half full body massage for, now hold on to your seat, for five dollars. Sorry, Jerry (my barber for over thirty years in Menlo Park) but I’ve found somebody else, in China
I am thinking of converting all my earthly worth (now that’s not a great sum) into these cards and leaving them as my estate to whoever. They have a greater potential for future value than all the Fortune 500 put together. I have been through three of these cards already (and I’m not telling their denomination). Suffice it to say that this institution is what has kept me from fleeing the down-side of this experience—the inscrutable imprecision of the Chinese—but that’s coming up in a future Dispatch.
The Art of Simple Pleasures
I have mentioned most of this before, but it suddenly has all come together for me. These Chinese are so happy because they have found very simple ways to experience pleasure.
You may remember my discovery and amazement at the ever-present institution of the corner “barber/beauty shop” and the fact that virtually everybody has their hair washed and head massaged by someone else (and for pennies).
Then I have mentioned the meticulous care they take of their meager possessions—they may have only one pair of shoes but they are always newly polished and more times than not by some else again. It is very common, indeed, routine for one to go out to eat and as he or she is eating to have their shoes polished for them. Someone replaces your shoes with slippers, you eat to your heart’s content and leave with bright shiny shoes.
Now I will add the ever-present foot massage (“foot washing” they call it) to this list of life enhancing simple pleasures. In the US it is a big deal to decide and to go and get a foot massage (a “reflexology massage”, we call it). And it can cost you the equivalent of a Doctor’s visit (which is fair, by the way, for it is as good as most Doctor’s visits that I have had—but I am off my point.) Here the foot cleaning ritual is as common as the hair cleaning one and as simple and pleasurable—see where I am going with all this?
And there are two sides to this providing of simple pleasures – many, many people make their living here providing simple pleasures – It is not demeaning – it is AN ART to provide someone with what brings them joy– (Indeed, they assuredly have the same service provided to them by another). Those washing the hair, shinning the shoes and rubbing the feet have provided sufficient income for themselves and their family for that day. I have no doubt that the street cleaner also takes great pride in providing the ‘pleasure’ of clean streets to the many others with which he/she shares them. Because I think it is Chinese to share simple pleasures, their work ethic seems to include a pride in what they are doing for a living.
Now this is civilization – getting the simple things that make you feel good and you need as easily as possible and making a living doing it.
Red Light Mayhem
“Troubles are like babies. They only grow bigger by nursing them.” —Old Proverb
With the new found concern for becoming “civilized” for the sake of the millions of expected visitors to Expo 2010, I feel compelled to re-submit my pleas for sane tragic laws here. While city-fathers are arguing about whether people wearing pajamas in public will offend or not, they ought to be considering how they can alter behavior in the streets that could actually kill somebody.
I have been complaining about the driving and traffic laws — about the preference given renegade drivers over pedestrians for the past seven years. They have the craziest traffic rules here. Perhaps the most insane and downright dangerous one is the turn on red rule – a car can turn right OR LEFT on a red light. It has bothered me ever since I arrived and although I have learned to defend myself from it, the logic of it still escapes me. I will start with repeating from a letter I sent to the editor of The Shanghai Star Newspaper in response to their editorial entitled “ Nine out of Ten Pedestrians Jaywalk.” It was bemoaning the fact that these law-breakers were hindering full access to the WTO.
“I understand your concern about standards of behavior and law-biding citizens. No modern civil society can exist without rules, regulations (even stop lights) and those that abide by them. My concern is that we focus on the right thing.
I am all for meeting international standards but let’s start with some common sense standards of human health and safety. I’ll tell you why most people jay-walk in Shanghai. It’s because it is safer than walking with the green light in the crosswalk, especially on the right side of moving traffic. At least while breaking the law you are alert to passing traffic from both directions. When you walk with the light in the crosswalk the tendency is to have the false expectation that you are safe because you are following the law of “go on green.” That’s what red and green lights are supposed to be for– to provide expectations of safety. But not here, you are far more likely to be blind-sided and picked off crossing with the light by a taxi taking a speedway turn into your path.
I don’t know who proposed the insane rule that a car can turn on red or what political clout he had. But I do know that it is illogical and dangerous. There are other places, in other countries, that have a turn on red option, but only after a stop (it’s against the law not to stop) and precautionary glance. The pedestrian has the right-of-way. Here, the driver already has it in his mind to take the turn at maximum speed. Watch out if you are in his way. This is absolutely insane. I shutter to think of Shanghai when it realizes its full measure of vehicles on the road. You want to meet international standards of human safety, not to mention rational thought, appeal or modify this “turn on red” insanity immediately. Then go after jay-walkers.”
Now the situation is even worse. There are many more cars on the road and the authorities have initiated their response to the jay-walking outlaws. Every major intersection now has cross-walk guards to keep the pedestrian off the street and crosswalk until the light turns green. Heaven forbid, you place one foot off the curb too soon – whistles blare, uniformed authority screams. As the light changes to green and a stream of anxious citizens venture out onto the crosswalk, those very same screaming whistle-blowers passively watch as two-tons of motorized metal barrels right into them. If the pedestrian didn’t get out of the way, I swear that the vehicle going through the red light would run right over them and it would be law-abiding pedestrian’s fault.
While this may be reducing jay-walking (although a wise pedestrian still knows better than to be caught in a crosswalk as a captive target), I ask you, “How does this reduce the danger of getting run over by a car in Shanghai?” It doesn’t ! It just represents a lot of effort directed to accomplishing nothing while avoiding the task of correcting the real problem – the insane permission for a car to turn on a redlight. It is madness pure and simple – with no justification whatsoever.
With the coming Expo the city is poised for disaster. Millions of foreigner visitors, who are used to the expectation of safety while walking in the crosswalk with the green light will be prime unsuspecting targets for the cowboy, race car drivers, empowered by a senseless rule. Unless something is done, it is hard to conceive of there not being accidents and perhaps even deaths.
Curiosity: Theirs and Mine.
I am a curious fellow, you could say snoopy. I like to know what’s going on and to learn new things. I will go out of my way to follow the sound of music coming from some mysterious alley or find out what some street corner altercation is all about. The Chinese appear to be curious too. But their curiosity is different.
When I ask, “How much did that T-shirt cost?” I am asking to know how much it is worth, how much I should expect to pay for one like it.
When a Chinese asks the same question, they know how much it is worth, they know how much they would pay. What they want to know is: 1) are you clever enough to get it for the same price or, alternatively, 2) just how stupid are you and how much can one get from a unknowing foreigner if they were in the T-shirt business.
The curiosity of these supposedly shy* people can be very intrusive. Many a time I have stopped on the sidewalk to write myself a note so as not to forget some thing I need to do. If I pause for more than a few seconds, I’ll have a crowd of people reading over my shoulder what I am writing. Not a single one of them can even read English, but they are ‘curious’ as to what I am doing. Walk down the street carrying a shopping bag and ever other person that passes you looks inside to see what is in it.
On Chinese Shyness.
“The Chinese are very shy.” How many times have you heard this? I do not believe it.
I have many embarrassing situations that prove otherwise and which I am too “shy” to share here.
I have never met a people that are so forward. They are universally direct with some of the most personal questions. “How old are you?” “How much did you pay for that?”
“How much do you make?” It has been a major effort of mine to defer such questions since the first day I have been here. My response to the first is something like, “I forgot” or “As young at heart as anybody you know” To the second, “It was fair.” And the universally applicable answer to the third, “Not what I am worth.”
It is not shyness we are dealing with here, it is all about being guarded – a holding back as not to become vulnerable in any way. Indefinitness avoids responsibility.
Having a card up your sleeve lets you trump the negotiation. The lack of definiteness, this “shyness”, if you will, is a means of protection which is quite understandable considering the historical experience of those who have taken a stand.
The Information Problem
Getting complete and reliable information is a constant struggle here. It is not just a matter of language difference, it is more than that. This has been the subject of many reflections over the past years. Here are a few:
A Reason for the Lack of Information
I have just come upon a very strong reason for the resistance to providing information here in China. It is very simple. If you state, or worse yet write something down clearly, you may have to live by it. You can’t (rightfully) deny that you said it. That you have changed what you stated is clear and obvious. This is a situation the Chinese DO NOT WANT. To be held to what they say, to be caught in their constant changing behavior simply won’t do. So, it is simple, don’t get pinned down. Why advertise that you will do this or that when very likely you might want to change it just at the last minute. I used the word advertise on purpose, for you would think that a business would want potential customers to know when its doors are open, when it is having special events, when its special sales are on and what specific bargains will be available. But they don’t, if it requires that they commit such information to public scrutiny much before the impending event (hours or even minutes before) they aren’t interested in “advertising.” They may (and most likely will) want to change what they have said at the very last moment.
I am finding that even international operations here are falling into this, as they have probably discovered that there is no use staking their reputations on commitments that they are not in complete control to fulfill.
Maybe I am going to just have to come to terms with the fact that I am an “information junkie” – that I like to know as much as I can about everything I can and that’s not going to happen here. Few others that I know are bothered by this. Everybody seems perfectly happy to be in an information fog and expending a majority of there time in wasted effort (usually justified by a trivial savings of pennies in a million dollar effort). What a waste – there is no comprehension of the idea that time is money, that the most valuable thing you have is time – that squandering your precious time on this earth by squeezing the most money out of every relationship is a sacrilege.
That’s what it is all about, this lack of committing concrete information is all about leaving it open to renegotiate the deal, to squeeze a last penny out at the last minute – It is all coming together now.
While this kind of false economy is not likely to go away, it would be nice, however, if the games of false information, feel-good responses and pretexts of helpfulness would cease. The way it is now you just begin to distrust everything you hear.
The Obsession with Incomplete Communication
The Curmudgeon asks?:
“Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?”
What irony. In a culture that is defined by incomplete communication, they are absolutely obsessed with instant “sound-bite” telecommunication. They are more concerned that you aren’t available or didn’t reply to a non-content message than they are to exchanging any concrete meaningful information.
I avoided getting a mobile phone for months, even though they are so convenient and inexpensive (perhaps 1/4 the cost in the US) because I did not want to deal with this obsession. Now I am a victim of THIS RAMPANT OVERCONSUMING OBSESSION HERE. People are on the phone continually—All of a sudden they become very possessive and demanding of your time. It is like you have committed a crime if you don’t answer your phone and immediately reply to a message. You begin to feel like a criminal with one of those electronic collar—always under surveillance. And if you disappear from the screen something must be wrong.
Ok, I admit I have always had a thing for the idea if someone calls you on the phone you are to stop everything you are doing and answer it—What an intrusion. I can remember having a beautiful dinner with family and the phone ringing—it didn’t even occur to me to jump up and answer it but everybody else raced to receive one intrusion after another (usually a tele-marketer). Ok, I am a little off the track but the same principle applies, why would you interrupt real human interaction/real information with the incessant need to “be in touch” electronically—for god’s sake get in touch physically.
What makes this hyperactive ‘mobiling’ so frustrating is that while there is all this, “Where are you now?” “What are you doing now? “Why didn’t you pick-up or reply?”, there is precious little transmission of real, meaningful communication. Amidst all this trivial surveillance it is almost impossible to get a concrete answer to a simple question, to get a definitive decision on anything.
Maybe if they re-started their thinking, they would see that this is an obsession with incomplete communication.
Vision vs. Exposure
“Be not afraid of going slowly, be afraid of standing still.” — Japanese Proverb
To me envisioning a goal is the first step moving towards achieving it. Articulating the vision as concretely as possible, seeing myself with the finished result is the pull and great motivation.
Here in China, I am learning that being concrete with a goal or concept is perceived as a limiting factor — a box that confines you. And what’s worse, a goal that you have admitted to having and haven’t reached is a sign of failure – a source of lost face.
No danger of missing the target, if you have no target to begin. The target IS what you hit – the goal IS what happens. No possibility of missing the mark-of losing face, when you don’t disclose what you are shooting for.
Now all of a sudden, what I have been thinking, all these years, is changing things at the last minute is not that at all. There was no fixed outcomes in those minds I have been working with – the “change” was only from an outcome fixed in MY mind (even though we discussed it together at great length). To them there is no change, there is no “from” – no outcome from which we have moved. They do not set themselves up for failing to reach a goal – they refuse to set it in the first place – a very convenient psychological safety net.
This goes a long way to explaining my frustration for the lack of planning and goal -setting here. An influential Chinese working partner here, schooled in US (University Ph.D.) kept couching it this way – “We need to stay flexible, be spontaneous, be able to take in new inputs and new ideas all the time.” (He habitually used this to change what I had been working on for weeks, at the last minute, for no apparent reason – the reason, it turns out, was nothing more than to stay in control) Ok, these are strategies that I embrace as well, but not to the degree it immobilizes us and we can not move on because of the fear of setting a path that we might have to divert from because of something we find from MOVING on the way. It is the waiting and NOT moving for fear that we might take the wrong step that gets me.
The work on my apartments here in China has shown this very clearly. The apartment I bought in Sanya with a set of partners, is still not finished (actually not even begun) after 18 months. On the other hand, the apartments in Shanghai that I bought with another partner were finished (fully reconstructed, decorated and furnished) in two months after purchase. The difference – my Shanghai partner and I set a plan AND MOVED ON IT. In Sanya, it seems as if we are afraid to move for fear of making a mistake.
My position has been the same since the beginning – the sooner we do something the better. The sooner we will learn about the mistakes we will inevitably make and correct them – all the planning (especially in China) in the world will not avoid mistakes. You cannot protect yourself against the hidden agendas, deceit and duplicity (to be kinder, they would call it the “renegotiations”). You have to uncover them and deal with them. You don’t uncover them by waiting and planning, you uncover them by trying to act, making them expose what is up their sleeves. And when you find somebody you can trust you go with them and don’t second guess them and treat them with unwarranted suspicion. In China, all the planning, drawings, details, specifications, and dotted i’s in the world mean nothing, it is all about trusted relationships that deliver! But in Sanya, we are 18 months later “unbegun” (is that a word? It should be).
What is missing in this “cover your ass” take the safe, “do not commit” approach
is any idea that individuals can make things happen by just doing something.
On a higher level it is as if we are dealing with conflicting beliefs in destiny vs. “free will” ( human/personal agency). Does personal thought/planning /individual effort matter or is it all just predestined — designed for us, by god, nature, power&authority (human government). If the latter – Sure, don’t commit.
To me, and I must admit that I am a product of Western programming, failing to reach a goal– to realize a concept, is no reason to lose face. It is a sign of creative thinking — Of Striving .
The journey is not the destination (how Western is that?). Here it seems that only the end-point matters, the process is to be kept a secret, invisible — a private journey, safe from exposure.
“If I could wish for life to be perfect, it would be tempting, but I would have to decline, for life would no longer teach me anything.” —Allyson James
Saving Face and the Ring of Gyges
“What you are… thunders so that I cannot hear what you say to the contrary.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Saving face,” is offered as the explanation for most every confounding behavior you confront in China. At first it might serve to explain a lot of the self-effacing posturing, humbling rejecting compliments and congratulations, or the often-received non-expressed rejection. In these cases, it is said that the Chinese do not want to offend, lose their credibility, they want to preserve their honor, protect their image. They do not want to embarrass themselves (“lose face”) publicly. Fine, I get it – a noble concept!
But how does that jive with the almost universal unreliability, the missed appointments and deadlines, the unfulfilled commitments. How is it not losing face to habitually say you will do something and not do it? How is it not losing face to purposely deceive and cheat another for your benefit?
How can one maintain their credibility when they constantly fail to deliver on their promises? Why isn’t this a source of losing face?
I just can not reconcile this apparent (at least to me) conflict. It seems as if “losing face,” does not apply to not doing what you say, only to getting caught in the act of not doing what you say, or doing what you shouldn’t. It’s as if an offense, if removed in time or space where there is nobody there to catch it, didn’t happen. If it is not observed by a ‘significant’ other, it didn’t happen. (And I suspect a foreigner doesn’t qualify as ‘significant.’)
That’s the only sense I can bring to this senseless panchestron.
Like Emerson, I think that, What they do speaks so loudly, I can’t hear the what they say.
Even the nicest people are this way, it is virtually universal. So this unreliability must be acceptable social behavior, it cries for a cultural explanation. “Saving Face,” as it has so far been explained to me, does not do it.
Now don’t get me wrong. The world is filled with unreliable people. Every nation, race, color and creed has them in their ranks. I am speaking about China, in particular now, because they have made such a point of codifying such behavior, or at least say that they have. Nobody appreciates or wants to understand all aspects of Chinese culture more than me. Any negativity that you read in these words is purely a product of my frustrated confusion.
This all reminds me of some of the dialogues in Plato’s Republic where, among others, the lofty and noble concept of justice was debated. “Anyone who is capable of getting away with injustice while appearing just would gladly do so,” say the Sophists. People don’t practice justice for itself, but only for fear of what would befall them if they don’t.
To illustrate the argument, the story of “The Ring of Gyges” is presented.
Gyges is a shepherd in the service of the King of Lydia who finds a ring in a cave. He soon discovers that wearing the ring and turning it inward, he becomes invisible. Whereupon, this ordinarily honorable man loses all restraint—he kills the King and seduces the Queen.
Sounds like “saving face” to me. Tout the lofty concept and behave accordingly when your actions are immediately visible. But if you are “invisible” and beyond any consequences, do what you please. Is this what Glaucon (Plato’s brother representing the Sophists postion) was talking about with his telling of the story of “The Ring of Gyges?”
I would like all ole China Hands, who love China as much as I do, to help
me understand this. Can any of you out there explain it to me?
To understand “saving face” has been a constant ungoing quest resulting in more than one commentary, here is another:
Manufacturing Face: Image over Substance
I have had my fill of the “face explanation”…. Creating or saving face is universally used as a reason for the oddest, most ironic behavior here.
I use the word ironic because for the life of me I do not see how what they have just done
saves them embarrassment or brings great status to their credit. How can it be that politely accepting an invitation or agreeing to do something when fully intending not to comply, is “saving face.” Yet that is the explanation I get constantly.
How is that a photo with you and some celebrity (political or entertainment) who doesn’t know you from the Easter Bunny elevates your status? Yet that is the feeling here. And when that very same celebrity is carted off to prison a year later for embezzlement do you lose face? Imagine the face manufacturing potential of “photoshop” with such a shallow and meaningless notion of image and self-importance.
The concept of ‘face’ may have once stood for “the respectability and/or deference which a person can claim for himself from others, by virtue of the relative position he occupies in his social network and the degree to which he is judged to have functioned adequately in that position as well as acceptably in his general conduct.” But now I see it as standard rationale for an obsessive concern for image over substance. What immediate impression does the behavior make? Forget whether there is any real meaning behind the gesture, any authentic motivation, if it looks good that’s enough. And if afterwards it is found to be nothing more than vacuous vanity that’s fine … no harm done…. The benefit has been done and there seems to be no cost for the deception.
While face is all important there seems to be little concern about real substance, the content behind the images. English translation is a case in point. The billboards and news stands are filled with headlines and partial English translations of Chinese messages. More often than not they are incomprehensible in English. So the question arises, why do it? Why have a message in English that a reader of English can’t understand? Answer: It gives the publication ‘face’ status. It appears, to those who can’t read English, that the publication is international and clever enough use both Chinese and English. It appears as though but it isn’t true. In fact, the opposite is true — to anybody who can read English it represents a foolish waste of time and money. How is this creating face ?????
I have spent the last 6 months working on a project that has done nothing but create the image of massive celebrity sponsorship – logo after logo of prominent brands are displayed on the PR materials. Daily new “big names” are added to the list of sponsors. Behind it all there is nothing, not one element of substance, not one concrete project, not one actual program. When I ask when can I development some content of what we might actually do, I am told no need, it is all going to happen with out it. Image is all there is. What perplexes me most is how they get sponsor after sponsor to sign up for something that doesn’t even exist? They are all just happily creating this hollow empty mask of face together, the lack of substance just doesn’t matter.
It has been suggested to me that this cultural difference is just a matter of different styles. It is not ! It is not a question of doing things in different ways, it is a question of doing or not doing – of doing things at all. It is as if saying you will do something behind this veil of face saving is the completion of the act in itself. And all others, so no one loses face, are complicit in the illusion of accomplishment. Yet nothing has really been done, just talked about – this is not a difference in style. In a real objective sense, it is the difference between creating a virtual reality or something real.
At the Expo: Pavilions Stamps
When the Expo opened each Pavilion began giving their visitors a stamp in their Expo Passport booklet to indicate that they had been there. I say began because some have now ceased to do so. It is a telling story.
Days after the Expo’s opening last month, I suggested to some pavilion staff, who were struggling with the long lines and waiting times for entrance, that they create a second line, by passing the pavilion and its exhibits altogether, going directly to the stamping station. Knowing full well the obsession here for image over substance, I knew that most of those getting the stamp would be doing so as act in itself — for the impression that they had been there, caring little about the contents of pavilion.
In the first month of the Expo, the enthusiasm for collecting Expo Pavilion stamps has become obsessive as things are prone to do here and my suspicions have been verified.
It has become apparent to pavilion staff that many visitors have come to their pavilion for no other reason than to get a stamp without even glimpsing at the pavilion’s contents.
People are walking directly to the stamp station and leaving, some bringing multiple passports and asking for hundreds of stamps at a time.
Becoming riled and ultimately offended by those that have only come for the stamps,
some Pavilions (Norway, Denmark and Sweden), have now stopped issuing the stamps altogether. As the spokesman for Norway said, “We want people to see our pavilion, not to get as many stamps as they can.”
Some pavilions have also moved their stamping out side as people wait in line, after which most leave the line altogether without even glancing at the inside.
If this isn’t image over substance, I do not what is. A stamp has become a symbol that you have gotten around – exposed yourself to a new variety of worldly influences.
The image of appearing to have been there is more important than actually having been there. Actually experiencing a pavilion’s content or even seeing it at all is not what matters, just the impression that you have.
Pavilion stamps have become a commodity and there is a thriving business selling stamped Expo Passports. Taobao.com, one of China’s biggest online trading platforms,
has 25 pages with over a hundred sellers listed. One of these entrepreneurs
has reportedly sold 300 in the first month for 750 RMB apiece.
A complete stamped passport (with all 300 stamps) is expected to bring 9,000 RMB
and there are standing orders from all over the world for it.
But the decision of some of the pavilions to no longer participate in this pretense of cultural exchange portends to cut into this image-building business.
There has been a big drop in price because Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Italy and some others are not included. Going rate now is 280RMB (US$41) for passport with over 40 stamps from National Pavilions — a month ago it brought 750 RMB.
It was only a matter of time before counterfeit stamped passports and pavilion stamps
are also flooding this new marketplace. The question is, “ Are counterfeit stamped Expo Passports any less authentic than the first generation fake ones that proceeded them?
Neither counterfeit stamped passports or ones collected by someone else represent an authentic experience.
“When selling image, does it matter which illusion of substance it is based on ?” A fake is a fake – Image signifying nothing !
Its all Flimflam !