Multicultural World

[chenchow]

Now, with about 315 members in Recom, I think we have a pretty great pool of Malaysians. Although majority of its members are still students in Malaysia and US, it is the hope of Recom Anchors to spread the wing around to Malaysians in other places, like Germany, France, Australia, UK, Japan, Korea etc.. So, we hope that you could help spread the news of Recom around.

Another thing, since we are from various places, we must have observed some of the differences between Malaysian society and people from other parts of the world. In most of the universities that we all study, we would also interact with other international students from various regions.

So, I hope that we could have people sharing their opinions from people from various cultures. Hopefully, we Malaysians could learn the better stuff from other cultures and make sure we don't make the same mistake, as the saying goes "Yang baik dijadikan teladan, yang buruk dijadikan ....." i can't recall what is the last word, but you could get what i mean...

So, hope that people would share your experience. And help spread Recom throughout the world.

[masterof_none]

This is a very good idea, Chen Chow.
We should somehow must take advantage of us being in the foreign place and get the best out of them and somehow merge it.

I think the discussion would be very healthy if we all can be critical.

I don;t think studying abroad is about Grade only, since the book are all the same anyway.

SO, it would be good if we know what sort of things that's happening in some place we heard very little. , like Korea or Russia. or Japan

I think for American culture, is almost self explanatory, we eat
Big Mac, use Macintosh, drink Coke, watch MTV, watch American movies etc.

But others, such as Russia, .... hmm.. wondering what Russians
do (don;t just tell us they drink vodka , we know it already ;-) )

So, it would be great if somebody come here and discuss about Australia(I heard Aussie would be proud if their family / family members are criminals , is that true? )...or some other places, like France, etc.

Cool things happens all the time. We should share them here.

Like the Malay Proverb that Chen CHow told us before :
" Yang baik dijadikan teladan, Yang buruk dijadikan sempadan "

here, sempadan means, we draw the border between what's good and what's not good so that you can't fall out of that border.

[Thirdshifter]

I think for American culture, is almost self explanatory, we eat
Big Mac, use Macintosh, drink Coke, watch MTV, watch American movies etc

First i haven't ate a Big Mac In years.. Never used a Macintosh except in the early 90s my dads Computer and god no MTV?

I would say in America.. you work 50 hours a week. Enjoy your friday night and Sunday before the week starts all over again.

What you decribe as eating MickeyD and watching MTV is probably what a 13-15 year old teenage girl from the surburbia would do.

[masterof_none]

Some say generalization is bad.

I made some generalization, unfortunately. And worse, I use metaphor to describe American Culture.
By eating Big Mac, I don't mean literally we all eat big Mac.
McDonald's is the symbol of American Culture : fast food. McDonald's is ubiquitous.
Now, lots of country, including ours, share this fast food culture.

Apple popularized the Macintosh, the Personal Computer in 1976. Hence, the whole world today use/own personal computer. (either IBM's PC or Mac. Apple only has around 3% market share of personal computer worldwide.)

Probably, MTV the only one that's not relevant to Malaysians yet (but it has been very popular channel , esp in mamak stalls in Subang and KL ).
But I believe college kids like us still watch (or influenced by) MTV.
I talk to lots of people. and they said they watch MTV (esp Sorority life or punk'd).

[masterof_none]

Anyway, apart from American culture, what else ?

How about France people? or NZ ?. Aussie ?.Germany? Korean? what do they do in the weekend ? when they close their shops? their working attitude? What do their kids usually do? etc

[chenchow]

hope that Malaysians who are studying in other nations could share with us what you observe....

In US, one thing I observe is the cleanliness. Public toilets are generally quite clean, when compared to Malaysia and I could say that most public phone, if not all, are well-maintained, or at least functionable.

Another thing would be honesty and trustworthy. People here trust a lot. For instance, Cornell Law Library. I could effectively go into the library and walk out with a few books without anyone knowing it. They trust the students of not stealing any book. There is no scanner or anyone at the door. As the library spans many floors and the librarian is only at 3rd floor and it is not inter-connected from inside the library. So, to borrow a book, you need to go out of the library from basement for instance and then take an elevator to 3rd floor and then reenter the library to borrow the book..... i wonder that would eventually be possible in Malaysia....i hope so...

While I am not saying that everything in the West is better, I believe that every society, be it Malaysia or anywhere has something to offer and something to learn from others.. So, if we could gather the best of the world, we would be a progressive society with lots of good values!!!

[Schye]

I heard that most of Koreans are proud of their mother and (guys) will tend to find someone who looks like their mother to be married with.

---90% of female in Korea plan or have done plastic surgery before. 8O

About Japan......
-we eat RICE too (to those who think we eat only sushi)
-eating quietly will mean that the food is not tasty. Saying "oishii/umai - delicious? is a manner no matter where you eat or who you are eating with.
-Kampung in Japan are really KAMPUNG.

Will add more later when I have thought of new ones

[chenchow]

After bubblesgirl and wwhong mentioned about learning of others culture, I think this thread will be the best place for us to see the observation of whether punctuality, or any issue that relate to culture.

Personally, I am very disgusted by the unpunctuality of Malaysians, especially the Chinese community. Whenever any wedding dinner, which specifically said to be start at 7pm sharp, it would start at 8pm. Those who feel that they are important will try to be late, so as to show their importantness. When everyone does that, it is just a waste of everyone's time.

I would like to argue that it is not just the culture of Malaysians. I have worked with students from many countries, be it from Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia, punctuality is a big problem. I always hate it when others come late...

[wwhong]

---90% of female in Korea plan or have done plastic surgery before.

i dunno about the exact statistics but from what my korean fren told me it's true. those korean girls will work like mad during the summer and get the money to go for cosmetic surgery. she told me it's always surprise to see her fren after summer (u know wat i mean).one more thing i notice about korean is that they have very strong nationalism (dunno if this is the right word to use) they will buy and use korean brand whenever possible and they are really unite from what i observed here.

american culture: they love fast and rough sports like football and ice hockey. so soccer for them is like too slow (not many people know who the hell beckham is here). eat a lot of fast food and microwave stuff and they are pretty much sucks in cooking. :) and they work a lot. Most of them are puncture.

chenchow said:

would like to argue that it is not just the culture of Malaysians. I have worked with students from many countries, be it from Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia, punctuality is a big problem.

yup that's true and I think we should correct our bad stuff and dun just think because people from other nations also have the same problem, so it's ok for us to keep it.

yeah bring this on. i think our sponsor sent us overseas not just to learn academically but also absorb the good thing from them. studying overseas really broaden my view a lot.

[eeyore]

as the saying goes "Yang baik dijadikan teladan, yang buruk dijadikan ....." i can't recall what is the last word, but you could get what i mean...

sempadan

[eeyore]

There a few things that I hope to instill in myself by observing the American culture.

Firstly, the sense of civic consciousness. Like chenchow said, the level of cleanliness of public restrooms is much better than in Malaysia.

Secondly, sense of equality. I can see many times a manager of a restaurant sweep the floor, back in Malaysia, I would expect the manager to get one of the workers to do that. In the classroom, lecturers do not look down on you, they basically appreciate your comments and feedback.

Thirdly, the love for knowledge. People here read a whole lot more than Malaysians.

I hope I am not generalizing too much. I'm just relating the experiences I've had.

[Dharman100]

Well.. I thinks its time for me to talk about Germany..

Generally..Germany is a great country with very high cleanliness levels..compared with our Malaysian standards..(I hate to admit that). The public toilets and telephone booths are also very well maintained..

One of the most impressive thing in Gemany is their Public transportation system. The complexity and flexibility of the system itself is totally well-managed with precise timing and discipline..You can see this when you see a schedule for public transport..let it be a bus, train or tram.. There a lot of ways for the public to earn discounts too..and at the end of the day..I have to admit that everything comes with a price..The fares are quite expensive.(for me, at least..)

Another thing is that, the people here are very highly trusted in maintaining the rule and order. A good example is the train station, you can walk into any of the train without showing your ticket or putting it inside a machine.. There is just no such thing here.. The passengers are expected to buy the tickets and they will be train marshalls who check your ticket as the train travels towards your destination..

Hmm...thats all for now..pls feel free to post in any questions you have about Germany over here.. I will try my best to answer...

Dharman100

[Schye]

I think from the post above has shown that the citizens in a developed country are more civic minded than those in developing countries as it is the same in Japan and Europe too.
So, is it the civic minded that leads to the situation of the country or its the developement which brings the awareness to them?

[wwhong]

i think both happen simultaneously. u can't expect people to be civlized when they have no food to eat. when u r full and warm only u will think about civic mind,etc. then the civic mind brings a better society

[chenchow]

All those posts are fantastic!!!

Dharman100, yeah, i agree about the trusts level. Like for LA, the metro is not even checked for ticketing and there is no marshall on the train either. What they would do would be just occasional spot check.

Wonder that would one day be happening in Malaysia? I really hope so. About level of trust, the most i have seen would be when in my secondary school, the canteen operators just let us put our money and take our change in the box with lots of coins and some dollar notes. It is all based on trust. Although that is like food in cents or a dollar or two, I think it is still a positive spirit!

Yozz,

Mayb a lil bout Ozz now? Hmmph, or rather Melbourne I should say.
Rightdo (a pretty common slang use here, heh, just cant help it. ha). Like other dev countries, the cleaniness hasnt been a prob. Toilet rolls are never out; breath-holding is never a need; Bin is everywhere....and so forth.

Generally, aussies are pretty supportive to their nation, in terms of the goods and people and sports, u name it....for example the australian idol lately, guess what, they actually came up with some sorta donation after the name of thier idol to support him/her. Aint very sure where the money has gone to though, mayb to call up or sth. That's how extreme it can be. Same thing happened for the Big Brother thingy as well. The extreme ones will just dress up with some sorta theme to show thier support. It's pretty eye-openin to see all these though.

Here're some of my findings bout the aussies, which unavoidably I've found myself to have adapted a few of thier so called culture in my two and a half year here.

1) You no longer greet people with "Hello', but go straight into "How ya doin'?"
2) Your weekends are spent barracking for your favorite sports team, rugby, footy...(but not for me, the ozzies are)
3) You use the phrase, "no worries" at least once a day. Stastistically proven. Heh.
4) You constantly shorten words. For example. breakfast becomes
"brekkie', afternoon becomes "arvo", barbeque becomes "barbie". And, barbeque is everywhere, with thier hotdogs and coke.
5) You've caught the blowfly buzzing around your head with your bare hands! This is durin summer..Man, they are HUGE AND FAT! btw, most of the ermm, organisms here are pretty big in size...
6) Thursday is the 'prime-time'..pubs after work...But, mamakin is nv available.
7) Friday is the protest day
8) There's always a shout out for BEER!
9) Oh, and even the plumber looks cute! heh.
10) and the list goes on...

jiahui

[weiweiann]

hello, everyone.. i'm a freshy in recom... nice to c u guys...
regarding to what ur have discussed above, i agree that the citizen in more developed countries tend to be more civic minded. this is really undeniable n i guess this is what malaysians shud learn from them. In australia, we can seldom c those so-called "bohsia" or "bohjan" along the street... the trains, trams or buses r very punctual... n the transportation systems r systematic. let's forget abt those developing countries with severe poverty... think abt malaysia... living standard is not that bad... y our country still facing so many disciplin problems?? bcoz of our education system??? (10 yrs nv changed) or bcoz of our government?? lack of awareness???
this is really sad when talking abt this kinda issue... to make a country stronger, our ppl need to b more civilized in the first place... anyway, seems that the problems wont b solved easily in the short future. hope our ppl can find out the antidote to the problems... :oops:

weiann

[royston]

Hi WeiAnn, Welcome aboard to Recom family. Please spend some of your precious time to introduce yourself. You may find it in:

Community - Forum - Networking - Introduce Ourselves
Thanks,

~ roy ~