An old Beijing friend of mine once said: “If only 1% of people are a bit of a prick, can you imagine how many we have here in China??”

Power of numbers, people.

I have been living in China for 12 years. Used to live in Beijing, now in Shanghai. I was a student before, have had all sorts of jobs and have been to 90% of the provinces. I have worked with a range of people, both local and imported. Ate all sorts of foods. Read, write and speak the language (Mandarin, that is). Been a best man at weddings. Engaged to a lovely Beijing girl. Have had problems with the police. And have seen the changes (most of them for the better) in Beijing and Shanghai over the years. In other words, I have been around. Having said that, the more I am here, the more I find out how little I understand.

I know I have adopted some rude behaviour as well – even though I do it with a smile (always works here). When in Rome, right? Psychologically it is normal to take on the behaviours of your surroundings: it’s called social proofing. A basic phenomenon for survival where you match others.

Now, to spice up the conversation, here are some things to consider and I would love to hear back:

1. When we have been in Shanghai for 7 months, is it fair to generalise by saying “the Chinese”? Isn’t that as ignorant as talking about “Westerners”? Asians are not only Chinese, and Westerners are not only from the U.S.
2. What is rude behaviour really? I probably classify “rude” and “civilised” similarly to the respondents in this thread, but we all know what is normal here, can be rude somewhere else.
3. Seek first to understand: are we really trying to understand behaviour? Because once you understand it (or at least a little bit) you begin to empathise. You don’t have to agree with it, but it will change your perception of the world and make it a bit more livable.

I choose to live here, however good or bad it gets. I have a passport and have the luxury of choice to live somewhere else. What would you say if your foreign neighbour bitches about the place you live in every day? After a few days, you’d probably say “sod off then”.

The splashing of human DNA all over the place willy nilly-it drives me crazy! The spitting…Oh the spitting. No matter how long I live here I will never assimilate to this particular practice. It’s a bio-hazard! You can get hepatitis and a whole host of things from coming into contact with saliva. It’s just bad social living. It’s like a basic animal instinct not to poop, pee, spit, or otherwise secrete where you live. Even dogs don’t pee and poo where they play and live. I saw an 8 year old pooping next to a trash can outside a mall in the city center the other day! Don’t malls have toilets…?

When I first arrived in China I tried to be zen about it. I told myself I was a relativist, that I didn’t have to go around expecting other people to live the same way, that I could dig that culture is a powerful and arbitrary force.

Over time that zen has given way to the worst kind of open judgment sometimes bordering on harassment on my part. I’ve become more than a jerk about spitters, poopers, what have you. I can’t hide my disgust any more, even though I try, even though I want to. I find myself openly letting out groans of disgust and giving deliberate full eye contact death stares at people who spit phlegm on the street. I mean, it’s at passive intimidation levels, especially when they do it near my house or in my neighborhood.

The thing is, I know rationally that it’s so rude on my part to judge in this way and to make my judgment so aggressive and clear, but it’s like this involuntary tick. Before I know it I’ve let out a venomous “uuuuuugh” sound and made the “wtf?” body position. I feel really bad about it.

Ironically Chinese wants to label themselves as civilized,modern and advance, while keeping all the principles that are different from the western standards.