Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Different Cultures, Different Mindsets

I ran across a link on facebook today that explains the difference between the Asian mind, and the German mind.  I think this applies to the mind of people in the U.S. as well.  A woman who is Chinese, but grew up in Germany, made this art to explain the difference between the German culture, and the Asian culture.  I think this is pretty accurate.  Here is the link so you can see for yourself.  Click here

So I was showing this to my cleaning lady, and she agreed with me on this woman's take of the Asian way of seeing things.  One in particular made us laugh.  It showed how the Germans and the Asians view animals differently.  The image representing German culture shows a tree with birds sitting prettily in the branches.  The image representing Asian culture shows those same birds skewered on the branches, ready to roast.  It's really true that Asians look at animals as a potential food source, and Westerners view them as a beautiful thing to look at.

So then I showed her some pictures of San Francisco, and we came across a picture of harbor seals sunning on the docks.  She quickly said to me, "Can  you eat them?"  I told her that we don't eat them.  Then I laughed and told her that she just proved the truth of the image of the skewered birds.  My first thought of the seals was how cute they were.  Her first thought was whether or not they were good to eat!  lol  

3 comments:

Euripides said...

I guess China never went through the Romance period that we did in the West. I can just see the faces of US environmentalists if they could have heard your friend's question about the seals.

Looney said...

The cartoons certainly give the stereotypes the way I experienced them.

Now to go skewer a harbor seal in the bay ...

Rummuser said...

If you include the South Asian countries in Asia, which for some strange reason Americans don't, you will find a lot in common with the West in terms of esthetics for those countries,