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Culture Shock I Met In Canada
AS a new immigrant to Canada, unavoidably, I met the culture shock as most of aliens. In an unfamiliar country, we may face difficulties such as environment adapting, family changing, job seeking and so on. Among them, the culture shock is a common one. Canada population is a mixture of different races, mainly English or French speakers from Europe. So does Canadian culture. As a result, most non-English and non-French speakers may face a hard situation of getting familiar with the language, foods and life style, as I met.
Language is the biggest barrier for immigrants in both their work and daily life. I studied English in China for 15 years. But when I came Toronto, I found that North American English has its own pronunciation and intonation which is different from what I learned ever before. Moreover, never expect a waiter in Korea restaurant, an India bus driver, an Iran tailor and a Russian professor to speak standard English. We have to communicate with immigrants from different countries in English of different flavors.
There is a vivid saying in china, “Food is what matters to the people”. Our Chinese look on food as a culture which can smooth the relation ship between people, enlarge the social net-work and solve business negotiation, not mere the stuff to fill our stomach. A. That is totally not the case in Canada. Here we must eat like a mute in restaurant. In addition, Chinese foods are mostly frying, which might give out much smoke and mist. Last night, my landlord was frightened, at least the 10th time, by the fire alarming when I was cooking. That’s the culture shock of food.
As for the life style differences, I can list thousands of them. The strangest scene was the parades of homosexuality I saw. China do have gays and lesbians, but they see this topic as a very private thing even to their parents, for their mum may commit suicide when she saw her children do like this. Another thing puzzled me is Religion belief, which is a culture of western countries, include Canada. In this immigrant state, I was wildered when it comes who should I believe, God, Allah, Buddha or myself?
Fortunately, there are many psychologists studding on culture shock. The same suggestion is “while life can not adapt to us, we should adapt to the life”. Yes, I got the rule, “when in Roma, do as the Romans do”.
(飘舞者 2006.10.25. 原创．请勿转载）
shouyi007 发表于 2007-1-12 10:24:00 阅读全文 | 回复(1) | 引用通告 | 编辑 |
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