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Lack of civility evident in slammed elevator doors
By Ni Tao |
August 1, 2011, Monday
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READER Fernando Bensuaski's witty prose, vividly capturing the nuts and bolts of life in the city, provoked good laughs and also some thoughts as I read his article ("Shanghai like a teenager tottering on high-heeled shoes") on why he loves Shanghai.
As a foreigner, he has a keen eye for the locals' uncivilized behavior in public that is often taken for granted by other locals.
One irksome fact to which I can personally relate is the lack of consideration of impatient young women scurrying into elevators and shutting the doors before people trailing behind can get in.
Once I shared an empty elevator with a finely dressed lady in our office building. When it stopped at a floor to pick up riders, we heard hurried footsteps coming our way and a female voice shouting, "Please wait for me."
I stood back to yield space. To my surprise, the lady didn't courteously keep the door open as I had expected. Rather, she closed it right before the hapless woman could step in.
I glanced at her, confused by the contrast between her elegant appearance and self-centered cussedness. She instantly looked askance at me, with the typical intimidating and condescending air of Shanghainese girls. Like a coward, I looked away.
Selfishness partly explains the impatience of pinheads, like the inconsiderate lady, who can get to their designated floors sooner if the elevator carries fewer passengers and makes fewer stops.
But I'm afraid more is at issue and you definitely know what it is - education on manners.
Mr Bensuaski is haunted by his boyhood memories of being tyrannized by a middle-aged virago when he forgot to give his seat to a pregnant woman on a bus. Since childhood we are taught to be good Samaritans. But does education have to come the hard way? I doubt so.
During my sojourn in Fukuoka, Japan, this May, I took an elevator with three fellow reporters to a conference hall. Chatting happily, we didn't notice two old women scampering toward us when the elevator door was about to close. One of them thus got pinched.
We felt sorry but it was the women who kept saying simimasan (Japanese for sorry). Even when they left, they still bowed slightly and said simimasan, leaving us deeply embarrassed.
Japanese conformity to order and civility is world famous. But there is no reason to believe Chinese cannot be as civilized. The culture of doing good has universal appeal. The reason it hasn't thrived here is perhaps because local soil isn't sufficiently fertile.
More reprehensible than the failure to be a good Samaritan is the eagerness of some to be exactly its opposite. One of our editors has complained that once he hailed a cab and tried to bypass a section of railings to reach it, but a woman - apparently a local citizen - hopped over the railings and stole his taxi right in front of him.
While it's tempting to think the blatant act is a result of inadequate public transport resources, the calculated shrewdness for which locals are notorious is similarly to blame.
I used to commute by bus. During rush hour, you can always hear peevish ticket sellers and drivers shouting pleas over the heads of standing passengers, requesting them to stand closer together to save room for others.
Often their pleas are ignored. Nonchalant passengers occupy as much room as humanly possible for their own comfort, oblivious to additional commuters consigned to cramped space.
Maybe these petty civility crises, or in Mr Bensuaski's words, Shanghai's lack of social graces, can be ascribed to the collective anxiety one may easily detect from pedestrians' fast pace.
Every time I step on the heels of commuters ahead of me in the subway and apologize, most don't bother to pardon me or even look at me. All they care about is beating me, and other tardy fools behind them, in the race to board the just-arrived train.
Mr Bensuaski likens Shanghai to a maturing girl struggling with high-heeled shoes. Actually, the simplest way to strut about with grace and ease is slow down a little bit and contain the urge to be always one step ahead.
As a foreigner, he has a keen eye for the locals' uncivilized behavior in public that is often taken for granted by other locals.
One irksome fact to which I can personally relate is the lack of consideration of impatient young women scurrying into elevators and shutting the doors before people trailing behind can get in.
Once I shared an empty elevator with a finely dressed lady in our office building. When it stopped at a floor to pick up riders, we heard hurried footsteps coming our way and a female voice shouting, "Please wait for me."
I stood back to yield space. To my surprise, the lady didn't courteously keep the door open as I had expected. Rather, she closed it right before the hapless woman could step in.
I glanced at her, confused by the contrast between her elegant appearance and self-centered cussedness. She instantly looked askance at me, with the typical intimidating and condescending air of Shanghainese girls. Like a coward, I looked away.
Selfishness partly explains the impatience of pinheads, like the inconsiderate lady, who can get to their designated floors sooner if the elevator carries fewer passengers and makes fewer stops.
But I'm afraid more is at issue and you definitely know what it is - education on manners.
Mr Bensuaski is haunted by his boyhood memories of being tyrannized by a middle-aged virago when he forgot to give his seat to a pregnant woman on a bus. Since childhood we are taught to be good Samaritans. But does education have to come the hard way? I doubt so.
During my sojourn in Fukuoka, Japan, this May, I took an elevator with three fellow reporters to a conference hall. Chatting happily, we didn't notice two old women scampering toward us when the elevator door was about to close. One of them thus got pinched.
We felt sorry but it was the women who kept saying simimasan (Japanese for sorry). Even when they left, they still bowed slightly and said simimasan, leaving us deeply embarrassed.
Japanese conformity to order and civility is world famous. But there is no reason to believe Chinese cannot be as civilized. The culture of doing good has universal appeal. The reason it hasn't thrived here is perhaps because local soil isn't sufficiently fertile.
More reprehensible than the failure to be a good Samaritan is the eagerness of some to be exactly its opposite. One of our editors has complained that once he hailed a cab and tried to bypass a section of railings to reach it, but a woman - apparently a local citizen - hopped over the railings and stole his taxi right in front of him.
While it's tempting to think the blatant act is a result of inadequate public transport resources, the calculated shrewdness for which locals are notorious is similarly to blame.
I used to commute by bus. During rush hour, you can always hear peevish ticket sellers and drivers shouting pleas over the heads of standing passengers, requesting them to stand closer together to save room for others.
Often their pleas are ignored. Nonchalant passengers occupy as much room as humanly possible for their own comfort, oblivious to additional commuters consigned to cramped space.
Maybe these petty civility crises, or in Mr Bensuaski's words, Shanghai's lack of social graces, can be ascribed to the collective anxiety one may easily detect from pedestrians' fast pace.
Every time I step on the heels of commuters ahead of me in the subway and apologize, most don't bother to pardon me or even look at me. All they care about is beating me, and other tardy fools behind them, in the race to board the just-arrived train.
Mr Bensuaski likens Shanghai to a maturing girl struggling with high-heeled shoes. Actually, the simplest way to strut about with grace and ease is slow down a little bit and contain the urge to be always one step ahead.
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