Post #1: Communication as Culture

"The key to cross-cultural success is to develop an understanding of, and a deep respect for, cultural differences...." These were the words that have caught my eyes in the slide sent by my professor. Ever since I started working I never thought that I would meet so many people who have their own beliefs, ideas, language or in short, CULTURE.... I never thought that being hooked up in JPOP ever since in high school would gave me a glimpse of what cultural differences would be in terms of building partnerships with your suppliers, co-workers, bosses and... students... I also never imagined that age gap really existed! I always thought that the inter cultural world is only about foreign nationals (maybe because of the word "international" is synonymous with "foreigners" according to my own definition of words... -.-" ), but it also is about the culture of other Filipinos coming from different walks of life, personal experiences, municipalities, provinces and regions. Well, thanks to these experiences, I got a closer look on how misunderstandings start just because of... language and the intonation of voice.

I have two foreign students named Sasaki Aika (Japanese) and Zhuang Ming Cheng (Chinese).

Let's start with Zhunag Ming Cheng first. Here in the Philippines, he introduced himself  to school as "Dennis" because his cousin, who have already lived here in the country for almost a year, have observed that Filipinos are not good in pronouncing Chinese names. He told me on one of my class that his cousin had a bad experience in being called incorrectly that is why he was randomly named as Dennis. Dennis was a very cheerful and smart boy. When I first met him, he never smiled. He never laughs and never shares stories to anybody. Since I am his Values formation teacher and my goal (as given by our school principal) was to create a bond between these students for them to be close with each other. My first hurdle was so obvious, how can I to talk to Dennis without accidentally insulting him? Since I have a little background on how to speak his language which is Mandarin, I took a risk in greeting him on the hallway on our first meeting. "Nin hao ma?", I said smiling at him. Surprised, he looked at me and answered "Wo hao", but then he continued to talk with me in Mandarin that I apologetically said that I only know a few Chinese words. He laughed and said he thought I was Chinese. Ever since that day on, I get to know more about Dennis and learned a few Chinese words. I get to ask him about some Chinese traditions they practice and I noticed that the Filipino culture and Chinese culture have some similarities like the use of Am Pao, wearing red clothes on special occasions, eating siopao and siomai, and such but, what I have noticed was, since he came from the province of Fukien, most of the Chinese words we know as of today came from that place which lighten up my interest. Because of those similarities, we became friends. As of now, he knows how to say some jokes and make silly wordings out of Filipino words. Yesterday, he entered the library and approached me, asking me to translate something into English. He showed me a piece of paper and saw the words "Ewan" on it. "What is this teacher?", he said. I told him that the  word means I do not know in English. He even asked me to give some examples, and so I did. "Example you asked me about something but I was not paying attention and you kept asking me again and again but I became angry. That is when I will say "Ewan". He was amazed and repeated the word Ewan but mispronouncing the word as Iwan. I corrected him and said the right pronunciation until he got it correctly. Since we are already friends, he was so pesky in learning more Filipino words. I jokingly told him that I will kill him if he continues but he laughed and said "You can't kill me or else you will be put to jail." We laughed and then I asked him, "Dennis, what is the Chinese of I will kill you?" He said it was Wo Shā Ni. Then I repeated the word but out of no where he laughed aloud. I looked at him puzzled but he continued to laugh. He looked at me and said, "Teacher did you say "I miss you?" I asked what went wrong and he said that I have mispronounced the word Shā as Shāng. According to him this means 'miss'. I have no choice but to laugh and told him why he did not told me I was wrong, but all he answered me was "Ewan"... 

There was also a time were I asked him about his relatives and family in China. I ask if he has an uncle and he said he has. He told me that his mother has a little brother. Without thinking I ask him again "do you have a brother or sister?" He confusingly looked at me and said "I do not have one because in China we have this One child policy." I surprisingly looked at him but a short flash back came to the back of mind, recalling my history class in HS about China. Then I looked at him, a little bit embarrassed and told him that I do know, that I forgot he was a a pure blooded Chinese.

I guess, I am lucky to have met such a very bright student like him. I learned thru experince that researching in advance about ones culture should be done first before making your way in communication to other people, especially to foreigner. If it were not Dennis, we would have created a short misunderstanding that might sound insulting to him. I guess he already prepared himself to be open minded to accept someone's culture or else, I do not know what will happen next. (n.n)

Now to Sasaki Aika: Aika is a very timid girl. Unlike Dennis who loves to learn more things, Aika is the TOTAL opposite: she hates school.

Below is the picture of my student and her beloved tutor:

picture 1: Sasaki Aika and her tutor Junesse Carteciano

She is a half Japanese, half Filipino, who was sent by her Pinay mother to study here in the Philippines because her mother knows that Filipino teachers are very patient in teaching students. Aika-chan came from a typical family in Japan. She has a Japanese father, who works as a kabuki actor (theater actort), a Filipina mother, a mechanical engineer in a famous electronics giant, and a 12 year old brother, a soccer player. She is a good singer and loves music. She’s a good drummer. She could create a simple yet bubbly drum beats within a minute by arranging the arm chairs, hitting those using her drum stick and whistle. She has one of the nicest smiles in school and her beloved tutor was the reason why she has this smile. Before, when I saw Aika-chan last summer, she doesn’t smile. Her face was always hard and she never was cheerful girl in class. If you try to talk to her, she just answers you with a nod, and if you’re lucky, she will answer you with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’. As the school year approaches, all her teachers had a hard time communicating with her since she only know basic English and Filipino. She doesn’t want to speak for fear she might say the words incorrectly. Her past behavior gave a short distance to her classmates and made her feel more lonelier than ever. Her grades were low and she always have her cellphone as her beloved companion for the first 2 weeks in school. I still remember my first conversation before: while I was waiting for my next class, I decided to drop by at the library to borrow some books when I saw her and her Chinese classmate. I approached them and smiled. Since I have a little knowledge in speaking Mandarin and Nihonggo, I greeted them “Ni Hao Ma” and “Konnichiwa” respectively. Both were surprised (but the one who was most surprised was me though… XD) Then they asked me how I know how to speak their language, I told them that I my mother told me to study another language aside from English. Then I looked at AIka-chan and and said, “Boku wa JPOP wa daisuki, anata?” (I love JPOP, and you?) I do know that I gathered up all my courage to talk to her even though I am not good but what I told her was made her chinky eyes widen. “You speak Japanese?” she asked. I nodded and said “Sukoshi”meaning little.

She smiled. Whenever recall back my broken Japanese accent, I could feel that I gave her a little hope that someone can understand her a little. From that day, whenever I go to her class and teach values formation, I always tell her to ask me questions if she cannot understand, but since she is afraid to speak up, I notice that she has low scores in my quizzes until I asked her what was wrong.

"Aika, what’s wrong? Diba I told you to tell me if you can’t understand?

She looked at me worriedly and said “Teacher, I do not want the class to stop just because of me…”

A week after our last conversation, our guidance councilor, Ms. Junesse Carteciano, a good friend of mine, went up to me and told me that she will be Aika’s tutor. She asked me to help her study Japanese. I told her to download some free materials in the internet or visit the NHK website because they have a good study material. 

Ms. Junesse is already in this field for 3 years already and has experience in teaching college students. She said it was her first time to handle such student and she has no idea how to teach her. As reference on how to handle Aika, she has a half Korean cousin and inquired on how were they taught in school. Using the free study materials, a little knowledge about how Koreans are being taught in a Filipino school and her wide experience in handling kids (since she’s a Psychologist after all :) ) , she began to teach Aika.

At first, they spend almost 3 straight hours after school to tackle all her student’s assignments. Since her cousin said that they learn easily through pictures, Ms. Junesse put all her might in drawing the sperm cells to the map of the Philippines just to make Aika understand all her lessons. As the days passed by, she noticed some positive results from her student, and tried a different intervention to help her understand Aika’s attitude. 

Her next intervention was to talk to her without discussing academics. They talk about Japanese and Filipino customs, their friends, etc. I was lucky enough to be invited on those 30 mins walks from the school going to Walter Mart Sta. Rosa and I call this kind of intervention as a “life changing field trip” ( I got the term from the Avatar animation series XD ) Her new teaching technique not only helped Aika express herself both in English and Filipino but also, boost her self confidence. 

As of today, I can say that Aika, who before was a timid girl, became one of the most flexible and cheerful students in her class. She already build good friendships with her classmates and her classmates to her. She even taught she classmates how to speak in Nihonggo and her classmates taught her how to speak Filipino. In short, because of that sharing of ideas, the cyclical communication method, paved way to face her fears and help develop her critical thinking.

Same thing, but, I believe that one has to adjust so that one could understand how to grasps one's culture. In this case, Ms. Junesse did everything just to understand Aika.

I think, because of this experiences I can define culture as: Culture can be bridged by love, understanding and a LOAD of patience from two different people who belong to 2 different beliefs, ideas, language, gesture, etc.