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Q: my extreme BCD
I was in a restaurant this evening and I shouted down/threatened the table next to me. I smashed my kuazi on their table. I basically told them that if they kept yelling and carrying-on like a herd of wild donkeys I was going to kick someones ass. I kinda felt bad a few minutes later. The reason I felt bad is because they were not doing it to be mean and to be honest they didn't even know what they were doing. Chinese are loud and conduct themselves in public places in a manner that would/does leave the average American or Western European in a state of shock/disbelief. Even after 12 years in E/SE Asia I found myself explaining to myself that their behavior is Not going to change, and that I maybe should just back off and let them do whatever it is that they are going to do. But I'm also a guy who is prone to acting out on my feelings and not really sit around and contemplate the right/wrongs, how comes & wherefores. I was pissed (angry, not drunk) and I expressed my anger. A bit too vehemently perhaps, but that's my nature.
Thoughts/Comments?
*
third-tier city
third-tier province
decent family restaurant (50¥ avg. meal)
I wasn't drinking and neither were they
Think all I can say is that it happens sometimes. Little things get ignored for ages and then Bam! Without even thinking a lot of us then let out pent up frustration.
Sounds like this possibly happened to you. Just put it down to one of those days.
I had a complaint from my wife yesterday about me reacting and it pissed me off as I wasn't the one who'd started it. Was driving home along a 4-lane road after a nice dinner. I'm in the inside lane. This little red sports car drive past me and tried changing into my lane.....while I was next to its rear side! He backed off after is hit the lights and horn but then tried to play silly buggers by purposely swerving his flash car toward my little cheap thing. I just hit the horn again, didn't budge and got side-by-side with him. Wound my window down to see middle aged driver and his mate laughing so shouted Sha Bi at then loud as I could. He the hit the gas and sped off down the road.
Then my wife had a go at me for swearing!!
diverdude1:
I think that is exactly it,,, it just builds up and builds up and builds up, then bam! Even this time I had sat there a good 10 minutes biting my tongue.
thank goodness I don't drive here! I would go absolute whacko!
ScotsAlan:
It does boil up. Without a doubt. My defence mechanism is to imagine I am a foreigner who has walked into a Liverpool pub on football derby day. No way would I complain about the noise. Ha ha. And I am actually a foreigner in Liverpool :-)
diverdude1:
@scots
haha, well, that's different. I'm smart enuf 98.7% of the time to keep my mouth from writing a check my ass can't cash~ I did that a couple of times as a youth and finally learned it wasn't exactly the smart play. I still remember one time back in the 80's cussing an older fella on a dark street in the middle of the night somewhere outside of Tacoma, he put a nice 6-shooter in my face and explained to me that I should sorta watch my mouth. Never forgot that and was always thankful to him for not blowing a hole in my punk-ass head. :)
philbravery:
i can relate to both DD and HW .it seems if you stand your ground when others invade your space you are at fault. especially the part where wife's tell us off for our vent words (oh boy don't I know all about that one) just remember that Chinese voices are different from others .
Think all I can say is that it happens sometimes. Little things get ignored for ages and then Bam! Without even thinking a lot of us then let out pent up frustration.
Sounds like this possibly happened to you. Just put it down to one of those days.
I had a complaint from my wife yesterday about me reacting and it pissed me off as I wasn't the one who'd started it. Was driving home along a 4-lane road after a nice dinner. I'm in the inside lane. This little red sports car drive past me and tried changing into my lane.....while I was next to its rear side! He backed off after is hit the lights and horn but then tried to play silly buggers by purposely swerving his flash car toward my little cheap thing. I just hit the horn again, didn't budge and got side-by-side with him. Wound my window down to see middle aged driver and his mate laughing so shouted Sha Bi at then loud as I could. He the hit the gas and sped off down the road.
Then my wife had a go at me for swearing!!
diverdude1:
I think that is exactly it,,, it just builds up and builds up and builds up, then bam! Even this time I had sat there a good 10 minutes biting my tongue.
thank goodness I don't drive here! I would go absolute whacko!
ScotsAlan:
It does boil up. Without a doubt. My defence mechanism is to imagine I am a foreigner who has walked into a Liverpool pub on football derby day. No way would I complain about the noise. Ha ha. And I am actually a foreigner in Liverpool :-)
diverdude1:
@scots
haha, well, that's different. I'm smart enuf 98.7% of the time to keep my mouth from writing a check my ass can't cash~ I did that a couple of times as a youth and finally learned it wasn't exactly the smart play. I still remember one time back in the 80's cussing an older fella on a dark street in the middle of the night somewhere outside of Tacoma, he put a nice 6-shooter in my face and explained to me that I should sorta watch my mouth. Never forgot that and was always thankful to him for not blowing a hole in my punk-ass head. :)
philbravery:
i can relate to both DD and HW .it seems if you stand your ground when others invade your space you are at fault. especially the part where wife's tell us off for our vent words (oh boy don't I know all about that one) just remember that Chinese voices are different from others .
Everyone has been there man. China is a very frustrating place to live if you're not Chinese. And maybe if you are too, but I assume for different reasons.
I find myself going through the day getting irritated by small things... people standing like lumps of clay in doorways,supermarket aisles and at the top of escalators oblivious to everyone trying to get past them, having to fight my way out of the elevator in my building every day because people can't wait for those inside to exit before they push their way in, wondering what filthy germs I'm being exposed to by the guy hacking up something from the depths of his lungs and spitting it on the floor of the bus while he's right next to me, the complete lack of logic or common sense I need to deal with every day at work... by the end of the day those 20 or 30 small things can become a big thing if you don't have a way to deal with it.
I've exploded here and made a complete dick of myself a few times before, but thankfully not for a long time now.
Everyone needs an outlet. Drinking, exercise, bitching on online forums, hobbies or whatever their thing is... deal with the emotions and they'll be ok, don't deal with them and they'll go mad.
ScotsAlan:
Well said stiggs. Agree 100%. Another way to deal with it is to be even ruder. For example, I used to hate the pushing and shoving to get on a bus. Now I just push and shove harder. I enjoy using the busses now. Funny thing is, I pick my daughter up to push and barge onto the bus, but once onboard I would say 90% of the time someone offers her a seat. Or at least half a seat :-)
Hotwater:
That's one thing GZ has got better on over the last 6 years. I regularly see younger people on the metro giving up their seats to pensioners, kids & pregnant women
I use insults... pushing onto buses - "Oi - children!" If they're acting like nongs (ignorant peasants) then I tell them.
Gets it a bit out of my system, and lets them know they're doing something uncivilised.
Occasionally, it's the shabi if they've done something really stupid and potentially dangerous (or just plain arrogant). Not that they usually understand my accent 
I swear only in English in China. I have blast, because DH-s don't understand me, and I can laud it and repeat it as many times as I want.
I rarely quietly cross pedestrian crossing. I'm like 'you MF..walk... you fukin' DH...walk...dickheads all...end of the crossing.'
What's the point to swear in Chinese, if nobody in passing cars can hear me?
I fairly often use Chinese 'ben', and maybe that's swearing too, so I mask it with 'big ben'
.
Classroom: 'you're big ben, do you know that?' with 'ben' pron. as Chinese and if mark on the BB always without capitals.. Can't say, I am not learning Chinese...
Oh man, you are racist (or 'cultureist' as some not so smart guys like to call it).
I leave aside the fact that disciplining the guests in the restaurant is not your job (your choice is to stay or to leave - it's up to the restaurant manager to set up and enforce the rules as per the owner wishes) as this I see of minor importance.
But your mentioning of ' average American or Western European' makes me believe that you certainly suffer to live in China and I dare to say it will not get better unless you return home (and as you probably are American so believe me that living in Western Europe would not make it for you better ...).
Hotwater:
What? So you never have a bad day here due to the behaviour of some locals?
Janosik:
Of course I have.
But I usually do not act like a spoiled brat ...
One more thing is interesting. When the expat overreacts and basically acts like a small, spoiled, stupid child so majority of people here understands that.
When the.same does Chinese, so it's just another example of Western culture superiority (not that such behavior would be OK when the person is Chinese - just the obvious double standard is shocking - especially when coming from people who complain about Chinese double standards ...).
RandomGuy:
Ah, of course, Janosik pulling out the racism card, as always.
You know who is the true racist here? People like you, people who assume that a culture belongs exclusively to one ethnic group, in this case assuming that Chinese culture belongs to Han people.
For your information, you can travel to Northeast China around Heilongjiang and meet Caucasian people originally from Russia whose families emigrated to China generations ago, today they are Chinese citizens as per PRC law, with the same rights as any Han person, now perfectly assimilated and undistinguishable from Manchu and Northeastern Han people if you don't see their faces, they speak the same, have the same culture, accent, habits and beliefs as any Han person out there.
Yet, according to you, OP is a racist for criticizing cultural habits, so you made the assumption that OP is a Caucasian guy criticizing Han people, while he may not be, maybe those people in the restaurant were Caucasian Chinese.
For your information, Chinese culture doesn't even come from Han people, most of it was created, developed and refined under Manchu and Mongol rule. Han people have actually ruled China for no more than 500 years in the whole "5000 years of Chinese history" thingy, for the remaining 4500 years, China was ruled by other ethnic groups and Han people were mostly farmers.
Cultures don't belong to anyone, I can be a Caucasian and follow Chinese (not Han) culture if I wish, and you are the racist for saying that I can't, horribly racist, as if I was saying that ABCs/CBCs can't celebrate Christmas or Easter because that's Western (not Caucasian) culture.
TLDR; OP is criticizing cultural habits, not a race of people, step down from your high horse.
Janosik:
No, I do not think OP is criticizing culture habits. OP is merely describing himself as spoiled brat who throws things on people (or their table) in the restaurant he and them visit.
As per my opinion the racist part came with defining 'average American or Western European' as better ...
I do not think Chinese culture is just the one of Hans. You may know that China has 56 nationalities and I know couple of Westerners who are more Chinese than majority of Hans.
I am just shocked (but not surprised though) by the double standards of majority of people here.
