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Published: April 11th 2011
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The Longmen caves, with some big Buddha's If that old adage applies to me being like the Chinese I certainly will not adapt as required. At least not completely. You see there are parts of the customs and habits of China that I, being brought up in the west, just could never get used to, not to mention try to adapt to. And this blog will be about some of the things that most disturb our western sensibilities. Let me stress that this is in no way a criticism of these manners, or a way of saying that our morals and customs are better. No it is just that for us some things seem quite disgusting simply because we have been raised in a way to find it so.
So what are these attributes? Well probably what most foreign tourist would put on the top of the list would be the spitting. Though I personally am not that bothered by it, because I have seen worse in this very country 18 long years ago and thus have seen the improvement. But coming here for the first time it does come as a shock to most people and is regarded with dismay to say the least. Sure it
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Some of the statues were broken isn't pleasant to hear somebody retching and see him spitting a green glob right next to your feet, but hey, believe me it was worse. In fact a lot of Chinese now, while still spitting, do so in bins or out of the window of a bus instead of just anywhere anytime.
For me the top of the list would be the farting and burping. And there is nothing worse then sitting opposite a pretty lady in the train and having her belch loudly without a sign of embarrassment. Unfortunately you will soon notice that you are the only one who is distressed about this behaviour. Nobody else seems to notice and if you pay even closer attention you will quickly discover that most of those around you are doing the same. Yes, loud farts and burps are a fact of life here and nobody cares. It might bother me, but it sure as hell bothers nobody else.
Next in line would be the smacking and slurping noises produced when eating. It doesn't matter what they eat, they always have to smack noisily, preferably showing the contents of their food to anybody who cares to view it. You
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Wei dynasty carving sit behind somebody in a bus who is eating in this way and you can almost feel the pieces of rice hit the back of your neck as he chews on his food with his mouth wide open, while talking to his fellow passenger.
And then, for me as a non-smoker, there is the constant smoking that goes on in this country. All ye smokers take note, come to China, you will love it here! Officially there are a lot of non-smoking places, but nobody cares and it isn't enforced particularly well, so you can basically smoke anywhere. While in the cities and in the east of China in general most people don't smoke in the bus or in the carriages of the trains, in the west you will be surrounded most of the time by chain smokers. I swear I have been smoking a pack a day for the last week. I am guessing here, but I would say 90 percent of the male population of China are chain smokers. This should pose an interesting problem in the near future with half the population on cancer medication! I wonder how the government is going to fix that?
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Thousand Buddha cave As I said, this is not meant as criticism. I am sure that if you are brought up learning that it is better to get rid of anything within your body than keep it inside, we as westerners who swallow our spit must seem just as disgusting. And remember that a couple of hundred years ago burping and farting in Europe was also seen as polite, it was a way of showing your appreciation for a meal. However at some point it was decided it was not done and so we have come to view it in a rather different light these days.
Finally keep in mind, that this is a gross over-generalization. Not everybody in China spits, farts, burps and smokes his way through life, and there are huge differences between the richer east-coast and the poorer inland provinces. In fact you are likely to hear a family from say, Shanghai complain bitterly as well about the spitting, farting and burping going on when they visit parts of the country side. Even this distinction isn't complete, east-west, countryside versus city, it really varies all over the country. But there does seem to be a general tendency to more
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Lotus flower cave of it in China then elswhere, otherwise I would not be able to explain the fact that it stands out so much.
Also looking at this list of traits, I have come to conclude it is all part of the culture of noise in China. Most of the above mentioned habits have to do with noise, and if anything the Chinese love to make a lot of it. When waking up they groan and yawn loudly, when spitting you have the retching to cope with, the farting and belching speak for themselves, and then there is just the talking and screaming in general. It often sounds to me like Chinese are fighting when they are having a conversation.
On a completely different note, here are some of the most memorable moments of the last ten days. I will leave it up to you to decide whether these highlights were negative or positive.
• The crowds at both the Longmen Caves and Wudang Shan mountain. Don't go anywhere during a Chinese holiday unless you want to share your experience with a couple of hundred thousand domestic tourists.
• The bus journey from Xiangfan to Yichang. After 24 hours of
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And the big Buddha and his desciples being awake I landed on this bus which had some very art-house Chinese movies (think dream-like sequences and psychedelic colouring), a total contrast to the usual Kong-Fu flicks they show. I can tell you that being in a weird state of mind already due to lack of sleep this only compounded things. But despite all this, I am still almost certain that I did see a Bactrian Camel at a toll-gate along the way!
• The train journey from Yichang to Jishou, where I had to endure an ten hour session of burping by a nice lady opposite me. I quickly put in my earphones and put on some music, but the louder belches nevertheless still penetrated through the Great Wall of sound I had created.
• Any of the local bus rides in the Hunan and Guizhou provinces where I endured more smoke than a man should be allowed to endure.
• The terrific karst landscape outside Dehang village. Amazing, and all for myself!
• The group of Chinese who cooked a meal for me in Dehang and paid for my food. When would anything that random happen to you in Europe? I dare anybody to tell me again the Chinese are rude!
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Some grissly looking fellows They are not!
• The young man who, seeing me frantically trying to find accommodation on the internet in Kaili after fruitlessly going from one hotel to the other and being refused, offered to help me find a cheap hotel and true to his word found one!
• Zhaoxing village, some are complaining that it is too touristic already, but off-season it certainly isn't. It was still very authentic and the walks into the surrounding hills gets you away from the other five tourists if they really bother you that much.
• The scenery in Western Hunan and in Guizhou as a whole.
So there you have it, a blog full of lists, but in the end the good far outweighs the bad. Sure there is burping, spitting, farting and whatnot, but there is also hospitality unlooked for, help in unexpected places and enough beauty and space for even the most off-beat traveller to enjoy!
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John Santandrea
non-member comment
Agree
I totaly agree with your list of annoying things, I have been living here in South Korea for the past six years and have seen all of them, however I think my number one annoyance is the sneezing and coughing without covering thier mouth. Enjoy your travels and be safe.