Another cultural weekend

[A view]

To there you go ... you are labeling me, just as you are accusing me of labeling. You sound just like the islamic extremists in the UK; quick to label anyone a racist who doesn't agree with your (warped) view. If you want a light-bulb moment, face the fact that not everybody thinks the same, or wants the same, or looks the same. You must be the perfect product of cultural homogenization. I can appreciate differences, and I have no problems taking the bad with the good. Go back to the start of this post. My observation was the general tendency for locals to be rude. Hell, even they know it - they made Mr Kiasu a national icon based on the culture. No, I'm not being racist, it was some other dumb poster who made that giant leap. I'm simply pointing out the ugly side of a culture which I find hard to accept, and hard to believe when a society has to co-exist. Even the local government recognizes it, hence the advertisements to change it. Most other places in the world have adopted a more polite way of living together. Shame they can't do the same here. In the meantime, my kids know what to expect, and why. And I find nothing wrong with that.

[let\'s generalise]

However, as a non-European, I also would like to share the observation that some (many?) Europeans/Caucasians have an exaggerated sense of entitlement here and act in a haughty, offhand way towards others.  

Surely you're worldly wise enough to notice that you can see that in every country you go and live in or visit.  I see that a lot in my travels around the world and it's got nothing to do with race, it is more to do with wealth.

Like it or not, a white collar working expat in pretty much any country is going to be better off financially than many of the locals of that country no matter what country we're talking about and I see the haughtiness in ALL the countries I've ever visited.  I was in Indonesia recently and I saw it there among Indonesian people who were richer than average.  It happens everywhere.

[Beg to differ]

Nobody ever claims to be a racist 'A View', they just display it in the way that they behave.  Other posters have not claimed to be perfect, most have admitted to having their own frustrations, they just don't come across in their posts as people who should be wearing white pointy hats.

[A view]

If you posters want a topic on racism - what it is and what it means to be racist and how to define it bla bla bla - please start a different post with that title.

If you want to discuss whether you find the local culture to be lacking in some social graces, and whether it's right to teach your children the differences they will experience in the world, then feel free to contribute here.

BM, if you find my posts to be inciting racism, please delete the entire topic. I am not racist, and do not intend to convey that view.

Thanks.

[french view]

In Stockholm, queueing outside the Astrid Lindgren museum and a very loud French family cut in front of a dozen people to get entrance tickets. Our daughter, then 6, were upset, as six-year-olds get about fairness. Two weeks later, back in Malaysia where we were posted, a white lady jumped the taxi queue, and she said, "She must be French." That was a racist remark and I explained why to her. That is what parents do; discourage and not encourage them to generalise. And, definitely not help cultivate a "dog-eat-dog" mentality. We don't all have to sink that low to join the bad and the ugly. We really don't. And, having lived in Europe for more than 20 years, there were more appalling behaviour than the ones I see here. Much as bad behaviour bother and inconvenience me momentarily, it doesn't make me want to get even. I don't want my child to do that either. At 19, I am glad that she doesn't. Nobody walks all over her just because she is not confrontational.

[<sigh>]

"She must be French." That was a racist remark and I explained why to her.

French isn't a race. It's a nationality.

[To <sigh>]

That occurred to me, too, but I kinda figured the poster just meant to say "bigoted"

[<sigh>]

Maybe the poster meant to say bigoted, but in general, I've found that people posting on this board LOVE to cry racism any chance they get and I'm really starting to think most of them don't really know what the word actually means.

[tell it to the french]

I have met French who believe that they are a race, the white ones at least. French as a nationality would include the immigrants, which some "French" would not happily do.

[Scenario]

Some social scenarios...

Walking in the mall, the person in front of you goes through the doorway
Option A) the person is aware of you behind and holds the door for you
Option B) the person is unaware of your existence and lets the door go in your face.

At the food court you are waiting in line to buy your food.
Option A) a person joins the queue and waits their turn.
Option B) a person pushes in, shouts their order out and the aunty serving stops what she is doing to take care of this person.

On the road you indicate to change lanes into the space adjacent to you
Option A) the car in that lane slows a little so you can move across as indicating
Option B) the car in that lane speeds up to close off that space so you can't pull over

At the buffet the kitchen has just put out a tray of cakes
Option A) the three people in front of you take one each and leave the others
Option B) the three people in front of you take all the cakes and leave half of them, wasted on their plates

I bet most of you would prefer to live in a society that chooses option A. Enuf said.

[to PP]

The following seems to happen in Singapore all the time although it happened a few times in London only when we shared an office building with a shower of city boy w@nkers:

You and somebody else get to the two sides of a door.  You hold the door open for them to go through.  They go through and do not look up or acknowledge that you had held the door.

That is so f***king infuriating.