Cross-cultural gyan

Discussing the cultural differences with my friends and wingies who come from different parts of India on regular basis, I have realised the need for tolerance because of the huge gap we have in our ways of life.

Early on in life, when I never realised that I will be fortunate enough to travel around the world, I had my perceptions. For us Indians, the concept of personal space is lost. So the old me would probably think badly of my landlady for not staying with her mother. In India, we would probably feel creepy if a person walking on the road smiled at us. But now when I was there and I saw all this, it just made me think as to why is it so different.

In my opinion, we are much more social than western countries, even our family functions like weddings have a much bigger invite list than western weddings and yet we are equally more averse to strangers on the street, again as compared to western culture. Most of us are very strict on our religion and the rules and regulations of our community and yet we are equally indifferent to the laws and rules made by the government.

But then there are similarities between cultures. In my observation, younger generation everywhere is more tolerant nowadays. Most countries have hierarchy although basis of it can vary from age to experience to knowledge to expertise to creativity. All of us have become more open to expressing our opinions and listening to someone else’s opinions. Most of the cultures are moving towards internal motivation for working rather than external rewards.

At work, all of us prefer things to be organized, people to be punctual and conversations to be two way and direct. All of us want to take hierarchy to be lenient enough so that there is freedom of expression and everyone’s ideas are heard.

As discussed with my friends as well, a lot of us might be tolerant to others’ ways but sometimes we are not sensitive about it. As simple a fact as if I call my friend Nisha, a Kannadiga, or Shravya, a Telugu, she feels much happier about it than me calling her a South Indian because they feel that we north Indians are not sensitive about their cultures and we stereotype them. My point is, tolerance is just one side of the coin. Sensitization requires observation and effort which we need to consciously put in to have long lasting relationships with each other.