I used to go jogging in the morning at West Coast Park and see others in the park doing the same as well. Since it was normally at 6.30 am, there were very few joggers around. Those joggers were mainly around middle age, causing me to think the youths have to go to school early during weekdays.
For the sake of easy interpretation, I will make a hypothesis here by assuming the Asian joggers that I met in West Coast Park are Singaporeans and the Western joggers are Westerners. What I would like to share here is from my own experience and it may be true. Undeniably, there are always exceptions.
I have a habit of looking at a jogger’s eyes when he or she is approaching from the opposite direction. The purpose I look at them is to prepare myself to greet them “good morning” as I feel happy meeting someone who like to jog in the same fresh early morning as I. However, from my observation, I shall conclude that the majority of Singaporean joggers will not respond to you or they will deliberately avert their eyes in another direction (at the ground, the tree, the other objects, etc.) while they jog pass me. Whereas for the Westerners, most of them are willing to maintain eye contact with me and greet me in advance or reply to me, making me feel better.
I understand that people have no obligation to reply to me as I was just a stranger to them, but I feel that it would be good and polite to maintain eye contact, or at least reply to me when I greeted them. I shared this with my friends and most of them stated that the reasons may be the other joggers have to rush for work later. There would not be any time to pause and reply to me, or they did not want to affect their breathing during jogging.
For the eye contact, I could explain it by applying the non-verbal gesture that we have learnt from the previous session in class (http://www.csupomona.edu/~tassi/gestures.htm). Asians tend to avoid direct eye contact as they think this is not respectful to others, whereas Westerners think that it is necessary to maintain direct eye contact as it shows your confidence and respect to others.These are the cultural differences that cause us to be so different in the way of communication. Maybe I should just give my morning greetings to Westerners and a mere head nod to Asians starting from my next jog onwards.
Here to share with you a interesting picture to illutrate the physical differences between races.
http://www.filination.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/08/78256645.jpg
6 comments:
Yours is a very astute observation, Jackie. I have had the same thought many times. Westerners are much more inclined to look me in the eye when I'm walking by them on the sidewalk, whereas Asians generally don't establish eye contact. I wonder how this behavior pattern evolved. Any ideas?
In my opinion, the Asians are generally more conservative and defensive as compared with the Westerners.
To be frank, besides jogging in the early morning, I myself will also tend to avoid direct eye contact with strangers who walk pass me, I am afraid of offending them by maintaining eye contact with them. I can sense that they will feel stress and weird if i do so.
In general, the Asians do not have the culture/habit to take the initiative to greet people that they do not know(no eye contact, no smiling, no greeting etc) unless for those who are their potential colleagues or partners.
Maybe the Asians think that it is weird to maintain eye contact with someone you do not know and greet them which may result in both parties feeling weird and stress.
Or else, you may try to greet someone inside the lift, someone sitting beside you in bus/MRT. I think most of them will feel weird and uneasy. (maybe not all!)
Hi!
I agree that Asians or Singaporeans usually do not greet one another, especially strangers, when they meet them. I remember my friend and I discussing about this when we were out at 7am in the morning because he is the kind who will say "hello" or "good morning" to people (strangers) he meet.
I think everyone should do that because it makes the world more friendly :)
yuklum :)
i have something to share with you here. I took bus 151 from Ngee Ann Polytechnic after completing a workshop on friday.
The driver greeted me with smiled "Good Afternoon", i paused for a while(since i didn't prepare for it as i used to just "tap and go") and then replied him "Good Afternoon" with smile also.
He is a young driver, i think his age is around 25-28 years old. I saw this driver greeted every passenger that boarded his bus and i could see some of them felt weird but returned him a smile as well and i think it was quite a interesting scene. I wonder if you have taken bus 151 by this driver before.
There are always exceptions that make people different from others and i think this is a very good example. ^^
Hi Jackie, I run regularly at the park near my home too, and I have the same observations as you do. "Westerners" are usually more friendly and have a higer tendency to give a greeting when we run past each other, whereas with Singaporeans (or Asians in general) this usually does not happen. Most people generally have the perception that Asians are more reserved and "Westerners" are more liberal, and I believe that in a way this has turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Perhaps what we can we is to buck the trend and try to smile and say hi when we run past people. As Yuk Lum said, this makes the world a better place!
Wei Chung
This is an interesting observation which I've also observed in my workplace too.
Like what I mention in my blog entry, I feel that comparatively Asians are generally more conservative, hence establishing eye contact with others especially strangers are indeed a rare sight in local context. I have to admit that I do tend to avoid eye contact too, but I am trying to step out of my comfort zone.
PS Chun Siang: I know which bus driver you are referring to! I did get a shock the last time I boarded his bus. Haha
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