The middle class and high fives

One of the nice things about visiting a country that has an emerging middle class, is that you can meet tourists from the same country. While I was traveling in Africa or even South East Asia, the only other travelers were from out of the country. One of the ways a traveler can tell if there is an emerging middle class, is if your are being asked to pose in photos while at famous sites.
While Jessi and I were at the Taj Mahal, we were part of the scenery for many of the Indians visiting from the rest of the country. Of course, no one in Agra (the city of the Taj) would want to take a photo of a foreign tourist, they see them all the time.
After posing in a dozen photos with individuals and families visiting, I started to want more. The whole process started to feel a little transactional. The family comes up with the camera, often times right after they had seen someone else take a picture with us, and point to the camera and then my face. After the picture is snapped, they walk away.
There was one group of 6 boys and each of them wanted an individual picture with Jessi and I. The funny thing was that they each wanted to wear the same hat in the picture. So one would sit next to us, his friend would take a picture, then he would quickly get up and exchange the camera for a hat the newly photographed model was wearing. Seeing this transaction take place time after time for six teenage boys seemed a bit surreal.
This was the experience where I decided to make something happen. I decided on high fives. Why not engage in the unique American ritual of high fives after taking a picture, or a snap as folks seemed to call it?
Many of the people did not know what to do when I put in my hand up in the high five motion. After I put my hand up for the high five and got strange looks, I had, what I can only describe, as cultural microshock. A brief and embodied realization that I was in a different culture. I had given thousands of high fives in my life. To put my hand out there and have it hang was, was hard to describe. Dispite people wearing Nike shoes and taking snaps with Sony cameras, the high five was still an alien practice. I had to demonstrate with Jessi and within a few seconds the high five was properly executed. In the hot sun I started imagining myself as the Johnny Appleseed of high fives. As the white marble reflected the hot noon time sun towards my brain, I could envision Indian tourists going back to their homes and giving high fives. How far could it go?

High fives in the boardrooms of Wirpo and Tata corporation?
You may now high five the bride.
The leaders of Pakistan and India solidifying a peace deal with a jumping high five?

It really was hot that day.

Intercultural Tip: Children approach the unknown with a sense of playfulness. Adopting this approach will help you to create new categories and ways of knowing . At the very least, it will foster a sense of humility towards the unknown.

The loud wrong songs

Sometimes when speaking in or reading our own language, we can be fooled into thinking we are communicating in our own culture. The idea of what constitutes items in a category is often what seems to fool people. I remember when I was traveling in Uganda and a city planner was complaining about a lack of zoning.
"They are building night clubs and churches right in the neighborhoods. It is terrible."
When I first heard this, I applied my own U.S. American, Puritan, framework. I interpreted him to be saying,
"Isn't it awful that you can build a den of drinking and sin right next to the house of the lord."
However, after a difficult night of trying to sleep with the sounds of music and merry making pouring out the the nightclub and into my window, then being worken up at the crack of dawn with enthusiastic Pentecostal exclamations of faith out of the church and in through my window, did I really understand the Ugandan urban planner. He was talking about the noise. I had forgotten how loud churches are in Africa.

Here is an intercultural test. Read the sign below. What doesn't fit the series.



Intercultural Tip: We group things in categories to make our minds efficient. However, these categories are culturally constructed and may need readjusting.

From high to NO context

Amsterdam has been my transit point from Africa and now from India. The more I cross through, the more the city seems to be taking on the properties of a sort of cultural quarantine or palate cleanser. This became apparent, when coming from a high context culture, to a low (if not lowest) context culture.

After I jumped on the bus, I remembered that there are different fares for different stops. I went to the bus driver and said "Amsterdam Centraal", making sure to pronounce the long "aa" as I had heard over the automated speaker system, just to avoid any misunderstanding.

"Yes Amsterdam Central, interesting." The driver responds in a terse English.

I paused and stood there in a daze. Partially because I had not slept in two days and partially because I did not know what this driver wanted from me. "I am going to Amsterdam Central" I say while standing in the front of the moving bus with my Euros out in my hand.

"What a coincidence, I am going there as well." The driver responds, keeping his eyes on the road while turning a corner

"May I buy a ticket for Amsterdam Central?" I ask, hoping that I explained in low enough context to satisfy the bus driver.

"Yes of course" the driver responds while tearing off the ticket and then giving the correct change.

The extent of the amount of context necessary is culturally determined. The bus driver and I could have done on further.

"I would like to engage in a commercial transaction in which I exchange these coins for an agreement, which will be documented in a ticket, to allow me to take this bus to central station"

Why was this bus driver doing this? I suspect, he understood from the context that I wanted to buy a ticket. He probably wanted me to use a lower amount of context communication as a show of respect. I could imagine him saying, "I am a human being, not a computer. The least you can do is use a full sentence to explain what you want." The interesting thing is that in a higher context culture, one could be equally offended, "You don't have the spell the entire thing out, do I look like an idiot to you. Clearly we are here on a bus heading in the direction of the central station."

Intercultural Tip: The amount of context you rely upon to convey a message has implications for the amount of respect you are showing in a culture.

Musings on trade and simultaneous discovery

While traveling back from India, I had a 7 hour stop over in Amsterdam. In this small amount of time I was able to get in to the Van Gogh Museum. This is an excellent museum that pays special attention to the artist's narrative and its relation to the visual works of art. One of the things that interested me as an interculturalist was the effect that woodblock prints had on the artistic community.

The interest of European artists in woodblock prints seems to correlate with the opening up of Japan to more normalized trade relations with the West. Can you image the excitement of having a culture that has had all psychical manifestations of culture hidden from the rest of the world, then suddenly revealed? Artists poured over these new beautiful woodblock prints coming out of Japan at the same time. The creative process of copying and interpreting began almost immediately. This, I imagine, is different than one artist getting inspired by a little known work of art. This is an entire community of artists simultaneously discovering and interpreting the same forms of art from the same culture at the same time.

It is not like the discovery of new art like today's Mashup or Crunk dancing, but it is an art that has been refined for hundreds if not nearly a thousand years. Woodblock printing has been studied, refined and passed from generation to generation in Japan for hundreds of years.
Also, it is not like the Rosetta stone, which was lost and rediscovered. Woodblock prints were a living art at the time they were revealed to the West.

While standing in the museum imagining Van Gough and his peers being inspired by, interpreting, and creating woodblock prints, then competing and teaming with each other to create a new artistic vision, I wondered if anything like this could happen today.

If Iran or Cuba opened up to more normalized trade relations, I don't know if anything would be different. I have seen Iranian movies and have listened to Cuban music. Now that information flows so freely between boarders, could there ever be a moment where a community simultaneously discovers an entire culture of living art work at the same time?

Perhaps I could muse a possibility. It would not be as concrete as physical manifestations of culture, such as a painting, dance, or music. But, it would be the invisible forms of culture that has always been present, but almost invisible.

Intercultural Tip: Different cultural traditions belong to the world, take them, interpret them and apply them to your own life.

Negotiation in a land where "Nothing is available, but everything is possible"

India, where nothing is available, but everything is possible. When I first heard this aphorism from a traveler who had spend nearly a year in India, I found that it did not represent my experience. Everything I needed seemed available, my flight, my accommodations and my new favorite breakfast parathas, in the morning. As time wore on though, I started to see the wisdom in this pithy saying.

A pattern started to develop whenever I inquired about long journeys.

"How can I take a train to Agra from here"

"It is not possible, the train is all booked. You must take a private taxi."

"I need to get to the ashram, do you know the way?"

"The ashram is closed, you should stay at this nice hotel and go tomorrow."

"I am going to the booking office, it's upstairs right?"

"The booking office is not accepting visitors today. But there is a new booking office this way, come follow me."

"I am looking for a reasonably priced way to enjoy India."

"Reason is closed, why not try my significantly overpriced way?"

Actually, having dealt with the "nothing is available" trick before in South East Asia, West and East Africa, and Detroit, I have developed some competencies.

When I needed to get out of town one day I successfully navigated the difficult terrain of getting a booking agent to order me regular train tickets and accept the standard commission.

Step One:

Order Chai.

Chai or tea, is how business gets done in India. In other countries, the drink is different, but the notion is the same. By me ordering Chai I am doing several things.

First, I am indicating that I will be sitting there for at least the durration of the drink.

Second, I am initiating a local ritual thereby showing respect and knowledge of the local custom. If things start to go poorly, I could always suggest "Listen, I sat down and ordered Chai, don't treat me like an idiot that knows nothing of India."

Third, by me ordering the Chai, it starts to enrich the power dynamic between me and the booking agent. While I do have the rupees and the power to walk out, the booking agent has local knowledge and the ability to trick me. Me ordering chai, increases my power because I am requesting a favor, but it also increases the agents power of proving me a favor.

Step Two:

Interrupt for advice.

While the agent was going through his rehearsed script telling me how impossible it would be to book regular train tickets and how awful the train is anyway, I interrupted him to ask a seemingly banal question. "Which is better the Golden Temple or the Taj Mahal?"

This does three things.

First, by interrupting him I am increasing negotiation power stance.

Second, by asking a unrelated question, it suggests, but does not explicitly call attention to the fact, that I know he is feeding me a line.

Third, by asking his opinion on a matter of taste, I am treating him as a person with opinions versus just a person who books tickets and pushes buttons.

Step Three:

Flatter

I am playing a game and the agent is playing a game. At this point, we both realize that we are players. The agent is probably disappointed that I am rejecting his story that the train is unavailable. As he was booking the train tickets, his ego could even be a little wounded. By the vary act of booking tickets easily, he is admitting that he was less than truthful regarding the availability and difficulty of booking train tickets. Flattery is the gentle push that will keep the inertia going in my direction. I noted the fresh paint in the office, and remarked how nice it was. It turned out the agent was rather proud of the painting job. He had brought someone in from the local big town to do the job.

Intercultural Tip: Set prices and standard policies disguise the fact that everything is negotiable.

Pushing to Prove It

As a person of ideas, I must always be mindful of my tendency to give the abstract more attention than the practical. "That's fine in practice, but how does it work in theory", is something I could be found saying. Plato would have grouped me into the Philosopher caste in his Republic, because I recognize the reality of the forms versus their shadows. However, with almost everyone else in the world, I must make my ideas matter in the here and now. This became clear as I met a fellow traveler while hiking up to an abandoned ashram.

After a few hours of hiking and discussing our experiences in India, we finally engaged in the standard North American identification ritual. "So, what do you do [for work]?" I asked. She mentioned that she was a message therapist. Multiple images of all the message therapists flipped through my mind, followed by various typologies of message therapy. When she asked me what I did, and I said an interculturalist, I had to explain. "Essentially, we help people become more effective in differing cultural circumstances". Being mindful of my tendency for the abstract, I immediately jumped into what I will call here an accountable explanation. I attempted to explain the work by actually working it.

I asked her what cultural difficulties she was finding in India. She mentioned that she hated the pushiness of people. We were eventually able to move it from a characteristic of people to an actual action, which I later found to be the pushing of people while in lines and groups. "Yea they really push here don't they? So, this is an example of a cultural difference I would help people resolve."

The next question she asked, pulled me completely out of the abstract and brought my explanation to full account.

"How?'

My mind raced through various models. What is 'pushing in India' according to the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity? How could one apply Personal Leadership to pushing? Is pushing related to any factors on the Globe study?

Perhaps it was because I was spending my mornings doing meditation or perhaps it was due to my work with Personal Leadership, but I told her the trick would be to separate the act of someone placing their hand on you and applying gentle force to the thing we call "pushing". Pushing in our culture is a mild act of agression. It is an intentional act used to put someone in place. In fact many fights in the school yard start with pushing and escalate from there. Pushing in India is just something people seem to do while in groups or lines. Old ladies push, kids push, it just happens.

"But how do I separate these two things" she asks me. She was really holding my answer accountable. I felt the legitimacy of the entire intercultural field resting on my shoulders.

"Just start doing it." I answered. I surprised myself with this answer. I was thinking about it while saying it. "Start pushing in lines and see how it feels." I felt I was taking a risk with this answer. How does it relate with my studies or what I have learned in the intercultural field? But the next question would resolve it entirely.

"But I am not in a hurry, I really don't care enough to push" she said.

"That is the answer. Here pushing is not about being in a hurry, or really caring. It is just what you do. When you start pushing yourself, you will train the body to accept this."

Value

If money is an exact measure of worth, why are some bills more useful than others? If ones and fives are more desired than a $50 or $100, shouldn't the bill's worth be reflected in its monitory value?

This question leads one toward contemplating how value is assigned and culturally shaped.

When traveling to another country, I find that things that previously had little to no value, suddenly become very valuable.

TOILET PAPER: In many countries, toilet paper is not provided at toilets. This is not only true in my experience in Ghana and Ethiopia, but also in one of the largest economies in the world, Japan. Public toilets or even private toilets in all but the fanciest of restaurants, do not have toilet paper. In Japan, people collect tissue paper attatched to flyers passed out at the train station, in the rest of the countries I have been too, TP is sold at each little convenience store and one ought to carry around some at all times.

While in India, TP, its whereabouts occupied a more significant part of my conscious mind than it is usually afforded. A pocket or bag full of TP brought on a feeling of confidence, much like a stocked fridge or full tank of gas. While a lack of TP was a source of discomfort. If we were to visit a nice restaurant or hotel, we were always impressed with the free toilet paper. "How luxurious" we could comment, with only a hint of sarcasm.

SOAP: There were only a few times in India where I found soap available at the sink. Oh, and the delight it became once I found it. Seeing the grime wash away after scrubbing my hands was a great feelings. As the sink turned dark brown, it was almost like I could see my chances for getting sick wash down the drain.

CHANGE: I forgot how the developing world seems to lack small bills. It is in the economic interests, to tell foreigners that due change is not available in the hopes that they would walk away. After all what is an extra ten rupees to a foreigner? Well it is a lot to this one who hates being cheated. I made sure to stockpile as many small Rupees as I could. All these extra bills started to become evident in my pocket. So eventually I started using two pockets. One was my Rapstar pocket filled with a big wad of bills, the other one my Improvstar pocket filled with small change.

HYGIENIC FOOD: While I understand that hygiene standards are different in kitchens around the world, I was surprised to see this advertised more than once. Can you imagine this being a advertising point? "Delicious South Indian and Mugali Hygienic Food".

I imagine what sort of things Indians take for granted and need to search for here in the United States. Relational commercial interactions? People knowing your name at a local establishment? Attentive service?

Intercultural Tip: As you are adjusting to things you once took for granted, remember you will start to take new things for granted.