There would have to be more of a point, right, beyond describing a friend visiting from another country, having dinner and going to a play area or museum? It's my daughter's friend, a 9 year old Chinese girl. An interesting part has been discussing perspective on different countries and cultures related to both our kids, about how that girl's mother thinks that an antagonistic perspective between Chinese and Americans isn't valid, given that people in both places have much, much more in common than differences. I completely agree.
My kids are Thai too; from two cultures, races, and nationalities. It's interesting how the potential divide seemed to relate more to the US side of that. China and Thailand are much closer; Thailand has a good relationship with most countries, beyond minor friction with some near neighbors over past differences. Even related to that their immigration and working rights policies are quite open for people from Laos, Cambodia, and Myanmar, maybe just not quite as developed to support local or foreign origin indigenous people who may not have as clear documentation of being citizens of anywhere.
From there the insights can be a bit vague; all this relates to exactly what everyone would expect. Americans are informed and conditioned to believe that Chinese national policies and actions, and to a lesser extent that of their citizens, can be unfair to others, and I would guess that's probably roughly as true in China. Oddly I don't think it's really more of a universal convention in China, even though the government there has much better control of media and education content and narrative. Why would I think that? I have Chinese friends, Amber isn't the only one, and they pass on what they think. And I've been to China 3 times, or a half dozen, if you count trips to Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan, but I see the last as a different place, or really even the other two.
Amber hopes that the kids can stay in touch, which hadn't worked out over the covid period, but we would meet them when her daughter attended a summer program at a British school that my daughter also attended then. Kalani moved on to go to a Thai school after, and just completed the third grade in Honolulu, Hawaii, adapting well to both of those changes. I also hope that my kids can continue to feel a connection with that friend, and other Japanese friends they have known and still do. Bangkok is really their home, based on how they feel about connections to different places, so I'm not worried about that dropping out, even if we can manage to live full-time in Honolulu after the school year that starts very soon. Summer break is almost over!
It helps that the girl visiting is very special, which I feel to be true of many of my daughter's friends, or even most of them. She is cheerful, bright, energetic, empathetic, and multi-talented. Her English is a little limited but she speaks very clearly and appropriately when she does use it, probably as good or better than my Thai (just more limited), and I've been in Thailand for 15 years. She has a strong personality; she's stubborn, when attached to an idea, and speaks her mind regardless of what is on it. She would make a good American. And she's amazingly well conditioned for extended play; we just visited a play-space and slide area and barely stopped running for 2 1/2 hours, which Keoni, my 14 year old son, said he's getting a bit old for, and is not conditioned to keep up.
All this makes me consider what I can pass on about Chinese culture or perspective, beyond it just being another normal worldview, supporting a range of very conventional life experiences. I'm really into tea myself, but that's an exception in "the West," and not common related to the emphasis I put on it even back in China. If you visit places like Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, or Taipei it almost feels like you are in any Western city; the general look and range of activities and options isn't so different.
People are Asian, of course, and public transportation is unusually developed, language use and foods vary, and so on, but there's not a lot of other outward difference. If you talk to people, as I have, tea contacts, my kids' school friends, and work contacts, they don't seem so different than Thais or Americans. I suppose that's not true in the same sense of Japanese people; they really are a good bit more reserved. Get past that and they're similar too; one of the local friends I've felt the closest to in Bangkok was Japanese, and a Japanese family in Honolulu, again including a friend of my daughter's, has been wonderful to be in regular contact with.
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that Japanese friend is just great |
When Amber discussed this with Keoni and I she tried making the point that China isn't so bad, even as a nation, that a broad range of atrocities aren't happening, related to ordinary life experience not having anything to do with them. I get it. Keoni and I had to express that some of the negativity is grounded, that China does restrict flow of information and internet access, and worse, and houses concentration camps, but then the US has those too. Either country might contest that negative designation, but if an "immigrant detention center" is holding people indefinitely and separating family members, in conditions that aren't monitored or discussed outside those facilities, then it just is what it is. China probably couldn't turn a blind eye to the homeless and mentally ill population that's living on the streets in US cities, even if their solutions may not be ideal if that would come up.
The US gets in wars for bad reasons, for personal profit of people with influence in government, and China makes territorial waters claims that other countries don't see as reasonable; it's kind of a wash. China is better at monitoring its population, at collecting face recognition based video data, but the US is essentially collecting and retaining all the same information in other ways. The US doesn't maintain social credit scores; there probably are real differences that are better or worse across different aspect range, maybe generally in favor of the US being "freer" in some ways. Of course that freedom doesn't help you when you get murdered for being out in public in the wrong place and time; in that case it probably would've been nice if the shooter didn't have free access to military use weapons.
I think these nationalistic perspective differences, the standard negative narratives, aren't helpful or positive, for people in any countries. Those evolve on their own, and support the aims of a few. I see it as a general level of background ignorance and foolishness more than a conspiracy theory-oriented designed shared conception, although I suppose in China's case maybe there is more coordinated intent behind it. At least US media extremism seemed to evolve more organically, for better or worse, driven by personal interests of a limited few more than an organized political agenda (which doesn't work out to be so different).
There's a saying that relates to travel dispelling these forms of misconceptions and limited perspective, to contact with other countries resolving them. I suppose that works. If you go with your daughter and her Chinese friend to a play area you see that she's no different than your own family members, and over a dinner at IKEA there wouldn't be too much to go on about related to real differences or antagonism between the US and China. They have play areas and IKEAs in China too, of course. That girl plays violin and does martial arts, not so different than Keo doing Tai Kwan Do when younger, or kids in the US taking that up. All three kids, mine and hers, took up roller-blading as an activity when younger, and all swim now.
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both of them younger, a year before covid |
We've met them one more time since writing this initial draft, with those newer experiences all the more positive. It was disturbing to hear that my daughter's friend had experienced negative reception from many of the girls in her summer camp class; they wouldn't accept her playing with them. Some of that could relate to language issues, but I suspect it's a negativity related to outsiders in general, not just related to her being Chinese.
My daughter wouldn't accept such a thing, if she was there with them, even in relation to someone who wasn't a close friend of hers. In Honolulu, where both my kids just first went to attend a school a year ago, they both experienced no such negative reception. The kids there are from all over, most mixed race, almost all including some Asian background, so it makes sense. It goes beyond that though; there is a real local culture in Honolulu and Hawaii that focuses on friendliness, openness, and acceptance, in spite of immigration to there being a really serious problem, pushing housing and other costs beyond what many working locals can keep up with.
Related to the visiting playing with a friend was the focus; it had little to do with cultural differences or similarities.
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