The Japanese media reports on bad manners in China (Video)

Hey James very interesting segment here! Ive comnented before on your posts and am a frequent lurker of your site. This took some attention out of me because I am currently in Beijing, studying the lang(or trying to, dear god its so hard) for 1 year maybe more. I must admit some of the things i have started to pick up, and after awhile the things u find as distasteful manners, ive noticed the foreigners here(the ones who’ve been here for awhile, mostly guys though) are on this segment.

the first part with the old lady is a bit exaggerated i must say. although when you eat here the bones, food u don’t want u do put on the table(sometimes via spit it out, but not in the loogie fashion)

cutting is normal here i must admit and it does get annoying…its a first come first serve type mentality. the worst being was when i went to a restaurant to eat with my friend i ordered food for my friend and when the food came out somebody who sat next to us said to the waitress it was theres(they ordered the same thing, however got their 15 minutes after us)…needless to say i was pissed and kept staring @ the couple but they didn’t care. i was annoyed but what ticked me off even more was I know China is a big population country where in rural areas and west of the coast people arent so fortunate, the fucker didnt even finish the food and complained to the waitress that the food was shitty…ive eaten @ the restaurant plenty of times and so have my friends we can all agree the food is not shitty.

the red light and the rules of crossing the street…no comment, im guilty of this as well as 99% of all the foreigners who are here. A retired police officer who is a classmate of mine told me lights and road regulations are more of a suggestion than anything.

the food thing just gonna have to get used to it, if those foreigners were btiching, then i assume they were more of tourists than anything. fuck most restaurants are crowded especially where the locals go(lots of us lao wai’s go here too because its cheap and good food) i dont expect waiters and waitresses to remember all the orders of each table and each person when theres well over 50 @ any given time during lunch time not to mention the people going in and out constantly.

smoking is everywhere just like in Japan from what i recall. However it is a big problem here, and this has got to be the one pet peeve of mine that I cannot stand what so ever. People seem to disregard other people’s unspoken desires/wishes that smoking is not accepted everywhere. Hell in the hallways in the majority of the buildings in my university are fuckin thick of smoke..i dont know which is worse the smog in Beijing or the smoke in the hallways. even the euros in my class complain which surprises me because the spanish chick in my class smokes but dislikes the fact the locals(and yes the foreigners have also picked up this habit) will just smoke in the hallways, instead of going outside which is no more than 20 steps to go outside.

space is limited and no such thing as a dryer here in china, i see no problem hanging clothes outside if need be.

I dont know if this will help James but if youve heard danwei.org i suggest u check it out.

in particular this segment
http://www.danwei.org/trends_and_buzz/no_more_stupid_guys_at_beijing.php
its the silk street market here in beijing, i sometimes go here. it’ll maybe somewhat answer the curious out there there questions tot he argument section of this video. like most things ive noticed about japanese investigative journalism(or perhaps the majority of investigative journalism) its highly exaggerated.
in here all things mut be bargained and yes at times it will get heated up, but if u really are desperate for that knock off 100% duplicate brand, then sometimes i must admit it pays to be an asshole.

Jay

In Canal St. in Manhattan, most chinese girls piss on the street!!! It might be a cultural thing but its the city and thats not allowed i dont think.

It is obvious this video is about China. Why did the uploader of this video have this in the description “朝鮮系中国人は、中国でも悪さをしています。”?

Oh…America is even worse with the street-eating!

people ought to put things into prospective. as hard as it is to believe, people with more money better education, etc , etc, are usually more well mannered (whether they are “fake” or not that doesnt really matter). A lot of the people shown in this video ARE foreigners from the village side of china, where they come from people are very non-judgemental towards each other, so when they come into a big city with other groups of people they dont know how to behave or how to adapt. As one of the previous posters said, if you were to see a real shanghainese you would be suprised just how civilized and “westernized” their manners are (westernized not in the bad american way). unless you live in china for awhile and see how life can hard for many of these people you shouldnt really want to point fingers and say that theyre subhuman or less than human just because one lady chooses to spit food onto the ground.

Having visited Beijing and Shanghai several times, I do wonder how effective the current manners and hygiene campaign will be, especially with the 2008 Beijing Olympics looming.

While the experience of being shoved several feet away by an old granny while trying to buy train tickets, or trying to avoid spit while walking on the sidewalk, was “interesting” to say the least, it’s best to avoid too much stigmatization. More “refined” public manners generally appear and take root as a population becomes richer. I think everyone has grandparents who can remember such public behavior.

And on a different note, am I the only one who thinks its a little too common for old people to spit loogies?