Hi all!!
Yesterdays lecture got me thinking as it had a lot of significance to my topic on cross cultural relationships. For those of you who weren't there we were speaking of times when we have had difficulties in communicating. I used an example of when I recently travelled to Malaysia with my boyfriend to meet his extened family and attend a family wedding. On this trip many differences in our culture became apparent and I for the first time felt like a minority. I couldn't always understand what people were saying due to the language barrier and at times this made me feel like a complete idioit as primary aged children were able to happily join in the conversation whilst i sat back thinking 'where do I look' and trying to use my minimal Malay skills to interpret what was going on.
My boyfriend learnt english when he was around 5 and when he first went to kindergarten (in America) he couldn't communicate with the other students his age. The beauty of the story of my boyfriend as a little kid was that despite this language barrier he tells me he was friends with all the other little boys in his class and that they played together during lunch and sat together in class. As time progressed he learnt the language but i was amzed that even without this vital communication skill he was still able to form these cross cultural relationships.
On my trip most of the family can speak english, except my bf's grandmother who whilst also being bi-lingual (malay & chinese) can not speak english. The relationship i formed with her was special to me as whilst we had to rely on others passing on our messages I still felt a connection in the warming presense she gave to me and her body language and gestures. My bf later explained to me that she was really happy about our relationship (being cross cultural) as she herself some 65 years ago had married into a cross cultural relationship. She encoured all her granchildren to pursue inter racial relationships on all levels as she says you have the ability to gain so much even through a friendship of different cultures.
I'm curious to know if anyone feels that despite cultural barriers/ language differences that they have gained in any way by forming a cross cultural relationship?
Or if there is a time when you have had a problem in communicating due to cultural differences?
Beck =)
2 comments:
Hi Beck, I really enjoyed reading your posting re: cross cultural differences. Two years ago I spent a couple of weeks visiting my sister who was living in Indonesia. My sister worked during the day so I would spend my days visiting the markets with her housekeeper or running errands with her. The housekeeper reminded me of your boyfriends grandmother. She was extremely warm and caring and extended her hospitality to me despite the fact that her english was very poor. I had a phrase book with me and so for those two weeks we would converse in very poor indonesian on my part with her very poor english. Together we understood each other through many nuances, non verbal cues and lots of trials and errors mostly laughing with our lost in translation attempts. However, we got by and it forced us to learn very quickly how to communicate as best we could. When it was time for me to go, I knew more about her and her family and her life then my sister did and it was quite emotional when we left each other, she was crying and I was crying but happy tears. It was such a wonderful experience, we both learnt a little of each others language, I picked up some fabulous cooking skills and it was truly a rewarding experience. x shell
I have been struggling with a language barrier in my relationship for thirteen years. My husband is from El Salvador and his parents do not speak english. As we have progressed in our relationship I have spent more and more time with his parents but I have never been able to really get to know them. My husband and I were in high school when we got together and so we didn't realize at the time that this would become a major issue for us as we got older. He also is not very good at translating. I have made several attempts to communicate with his mother through email but each time I have tried she does not follow through. We are expecting our first child in six weeks and this problem has become a black could for me. So any advice at all from anyone going through a similar situation would be greatly appreciated.
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