Hello everyone,
Two months ago if you sat me down and told me everything I would run into while in China I probably would have responded with a laugh and a roll of my eyes. However, it's been 6 weeks since I arrived and I still trip up over some of these cultural differences. I wish someone had told me about these differences, as it would have made life here so much easier in the beginning. Whether you're studying abroad in China in the coming months, or just curious, here are some of the biggest cultural differences you'll notice, as an American, studying abroad in China.
- Temperature is in Celsius
- This was a huge shock to me, mainly due to the fact that I had completely forgotten that every other country but the USA uses the metric system. Trust me, nothing freaks you out more than waking up and seeing the weather outside is 25 degrees in the middle of September.
- Measurements are in meters
- Again, one of those 'only in America' moments was when I was in class learning the vocab and my teacher told us how tall she is in centimeters. She proceeded to ask the rest of the class how tall we were, and it was only then that I had to ask, "But how tall are you?" To her surprise, and to everyone else's "Ahh, that's right. She's American.", she had to teach me the conversion rate between a foot and a centimeter. On the bright side after 8 weeks I won't need to tell people how tall I am in centimeters anymore.
- Street fashion is real and quite popular
- For some odd reason, everyone in China follows their own rule when it comes to fashion. From my perspective, it appears that people here don't care about whether or not the clothes match but rather, do the clothes suit them. This means you'll see girls with shoes that don't match their pants, shirts that hang out below their skirts (while tucked in), and expensive looking accessories that you can't tell are real or not because you've never seen the brand in real life. It's made me realize that the emphasis placed on fashion and cohesiveness is an American thing, and yet somehow the Chinese people still pull off this lack of.
- Chinglish will never make sense, and even when it does it doesn't
- Finding signs with an attempt at English is funny, but there is a whole other level of comedy when it comes to fashion and accessories that try and employ the use of the English language. As a foreigner in China, there is a certain joy in seeing English on objects or clothing. Sometimes its funny, other times its just plain confusing. Either way, you're going to be amused.
- School in China is nothing like school in the United States
- Now, granted I knew that schooling in the two countries was different, but I didn't know just how different it would be. Classes are taught using only the textbook and creativity is not encouraged inside the Chines classroom. In America, creativity and independence is stressed, whereas in China I've noticed that everyone is taught the same way and that learning is very much the same. Conformity is very much prevalent in the classroom!
With all of this being said, I still find myself more and more comfortable here as the days pass. Have you ever been to China? What were things no one told you about that you wish you had known?
Until next time,
