Part 2 of debates... and not an Alphard in sight.

Whoops.  Rather a large gap between posts.

When you have a newborn around, energy and time is drained from you at an alarming rate!  Love of course, is in abundance, just not energy!

This post is the follow - up to the previous post about my school debates and other such things.

The second debate was 'How has Western Culture affected Malaysia?'.  I knew this would get people talking.  As one student researched and pointed out - 'It seems, these days, that it's not PC to praise Western Culture - or worse, Western Civilisation'.  How true.  I don't want to come across antagonistic, but it seems to be open season on all things Western these days.

In any event, I put my own feelings aside for this debate - I was much more interested to see the students debate this and what their views on this matter were.  And I learned a few things too.  I learned that Western culture is far, far bigger and harder to define, therefore is harder to pin down.  It's become such a monster of a culture that overseas, any change in traditional or cultural behaviour is put down to 'Westernisation' whether the change that took place was a natural change or not.  It's quite an achievement for the West in one aspect; to have put the rest of the world into a bind - do we embrace the West or reject it?  And I for one certainly didn't go to any meeting regarding world domination.  I missed the memo.

Nevertheless, it was a fascinating debate.  Apart from some mindnumbingly disastrous generalisations, the students managed to nail down a few key concepts and were able to vent some long - pent - up frustrations in the process!

I must confess, I want to share some of the concepts about Western Civilisation which were brought up to show how Western Culture had positively benefitted Malaysia.  Some of these made me giggle, but that's very unprofessional.

I quote:

1. Charity. Surprise, it's not a universal value.  In Asian cultures, the family comes first, then friends.  Strangers are 'not my problem'.  The idea that anyone would go out of his or her way to care for a total stranger, or offer him aid, is completely alien and incomprehensible to most Asians.  That's part of the reason orphans are not well taken care of.  If it's not my child, why should I care for it?  It's only national pride and embarrassment which has prompted Koreans for example, to encourage adoption within their country.

2. Courtesy to strangers.  In Canada, if you walk through a door behind someone else, you expect the person in front of you to at least make sure that it doesn't swing shut in your face.  In China or Korea, you can't assume that.  And when I hold the door open for strangers in China or Korea, they are dumbfounded.  In China, if you want to get off a crowded bus, you just push and elbow aside anyone in your way.  Nobody is offended or surprised.  Also, lying to or cheating a customer (as long as he's a stranger) is considered in no way immoral.

3. Waiting in line.  Yes, believe it or not, queuing is not a universal practice.  If you've ever seen Chinese at a bus stop or train station, you'll realise this.  The result is absolute chaos, and occasional injury.

4. The honour system.  Corruption in Africa, Latin America and Asia is staggering.  In many countries it is impossible to get any business done without bribing someone. Cheating at many Asian universities is so bad that a degree is virtually meaningless.  Even driver's licences and (probably) pilot's licences can simply be bought.  Forget about getting justice in court if your adversary is richer than you.

5. Civic responsibility.  Oddly enough, in a supposedly socialist country like China, there is no sense of civic or communal responsibility.  People just throw garbage in any communal space, and no-one thinks of cleaning it up, except the paid street sweepers.  Even in apartment buildings, the common areas (stairwells etc) are often filthy and in terrible disrepair, and no-one seems to bother about it because it's not their own private space.

6. Addresses.  This is a small thing, but surprisingly in many parts of the world they haven't figured out how to do street addresses.  In China, they don't commonly have street signs - except perhaps for major thoroughfares.  In Korea, building numbers are chronological, not geographical.  In other words, the first building erected on a street is 'one', the second is 'two' - so on a typical street the addresses would be: 1,42, 105, 3, 14, 7, 189 etc.  Malaysia puts street signs at the 45 degree angle to the road, so you never know which road it's refering to! 

7. Planning ahead.  One of the infuriating things about working in Malaysia, and to a lesser extent, other parts of Asia, is that they are incapable (it seems) of forethought.  I have seen the worst examples of public planning anywhere and the completely unorganised methods by which to build even a wall that you are left wondering what the guy in charge is actually doing;  I suggest seeing number 4.

There are other virtues: sanitation, punctuality, etc etc.  but that's enough for now.  In my next post you'll get the other side of the coin.  As you can see, from this students arguement, Western culture isn't so bad!