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Chuck out those stereotypes of East and West
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WHEN I studied in California around 10 years ago, mountain hiking was my No. 1 pastime — and I walked or ran about five miles with my wife and friends almost once a week in the hills near campus to breathe in fresh air and stay fit.
Upon returning to Beijing in 2003, however, I found myself most often invited by old friends to various indoor venues with fancy decor and expensive service, but foul air.
Over the last decade, my wife and I have continued hiking, remembering our good old days in America. But most of our friends in Beijing and Shanghai distance themselves from hiking — a simple and healthy way of life lived by ancient Chinese who believed that “the benevolent love mountains and the wise like rivers.”
To a certain extent, many Americans today are living a life a bit more frugal and closer to nature by driving less and consuming less (partly because of the economic slump, but mainly because they’re more aware of the environment), while many of my fellow countrymen are walling themselves off from nature by driving and consuming more.
Many of my acquaintances who have studied or lived in America are also surprised at how “backward” many Americans’ way of life is today, in comparison to the pretentious and showy life that marks many of China’s nouveau riche and those who aspire to be nouveau riche.
Certainly not all Americans lead a simple life and not all Chinese lead an empty life of vanity, but it makes me do a double-take to see how China’s traditional way of life — closer to nature — is being approached by more and more Americans, and fewer and fewer Chinese, especially those in cities.
I would say education has played a role in this change.
I’ve talked to many American friends and they all tell me that their parents expect them simply to be a “good person” — be kind to others, to nature, and do their best at whatever they want in life.
You know what many of our modern-day parents in China expect most from their children: visible, material success — first in school, then college, then in a secure, well-paying job. Mountain hiking certainly doesn’t count as success. Being rich does.
I’m writing this article not to say America is more environmentally friendly than China. Indeed, America remains the world’s biggest polluter in terms of per capita car emissions.
But we should not fall into the popular trap of stereotyping and stigmatizing the American way of life as wickedly profligate and “wasteful,” as some of my best friends would. Doing so blinds us from seeing our own problems.
Pardon our own mistakes
In today’s cross cultural exchanges, it’s easy to point a finger at others and pardon, or never see, one’s own mistakes.
We all know ancient Chinese lived in harmony with nature and abhorred anything like the Western Industrial Revolution.
But China has changed, with its own industrial revolution, and so has the West. Indeed, when I talk about ancient Chinese art and music, more Americans and other Westerners are interested than my Chinese colleagues and friends.
It was a Swedish woman, not a Chinese, who wrote the definitive book on China’s most noble musical instrument — guqin.
Today’s world of globalization defies simplistic division between the East and the West. What is best is best.
I have an American colleague in her 60s. She exercises every day. She walks fast from home to office and back again, and works out at the gym. She looks like a young lady. She is very much like a Taoist who treats exercise in nature as the ultimate way to happiness.
In contrast, more and more Chinese are moving on wheels. China has replaced America as the world’s biggest car market. That says a lot about the difficulty in sticking to the imagined East-West divide. This imagined East-West divide also applies to today’s global politics and perceptions, where nuance is important but stereotypes still prevail.
Some people from the West say they have better and more transparent governance than others, thus making any meaningful and nuanced discussions elusive.
“Follow the way of water,” a Taoist monk on Wudang Mountain told me this spring when I visited. “Lie low and elevate others.”
If everyone keeps a low profile and sees others’ merits, we would all be happier with ourselves and with each other.
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