Smoking In China – A Perfect Example
January 28th, 2008 by Stephen Cronin [Shortlink]
Image Source: Match smokeLicense
This is follow up to my previous post on smoking in China. I just want to highlight a related experience we just had.
Two days after my previous post, a stranger visited our house to look at something we were selling. No sooner than he’d walked in, did he produce a cigarette packet and offer me one. I refused automatically, using wo bu chou this time. He nodded and said something like “oh, bu chou, bu chou, okay” and proceeded to light up.
Neither my wife or myself smoke and we have a young child (who was sitting right there), so we don’t appreciate smoke in the house. My wife had a polite word and the cigarette was put out immediately. There were no hard feelings and the conversation continued normally.
By Western standards, it’s incredibly rude to walk into someone else’s house and start smoking without asking permission. In fact, it’s a little bold to even consider smoking in someone’s house when you’re only there to look at something you might buy.
By Chinese standards, he wasn’t being rude at all. In fact, I probably should have offered him a cigarette! It was completely natural for him to walk in out of the cold, into someone’s house and then to have a smoke. There was nothing bold or rude about it from his point of view.
The differences in culture and behaviour make life interesting in China. In some cases, the differences are delightful. In other cases, such as this, they are annoying.
It’s important to remember that things are different in China and to try to be tolerant. I’m not saying you have to accept everything (we didn’t put up with the smoke), but at least try to understand the differences and act politely.
Anyway, I wanted to share this experience as it highlights issues related to smoking in China.
I think the smoking culture is prevalent in most Asian countries, China being at the top of the list. The last time I was in Japan, tobacco of all kinds was still being advertised on a massive scale.
Here in the Philippines, although they’re westernized for the most part, I would venture to say that at least a third of the population are smokers, mostly male.
Oh, by the way, the last time I checked, 10+8 = 18. Not so, according to your plugin.
Hi RT,
Thanks for the information. I’m not surprised that it’s similar in other parts of Asia (though I have no first hand knowledge). I suspect there are quite a few other things which are similar throughout Asia.
Do more western expats smoke in the Phillipines than you’d expect back home. I got a bit of a surprise last week when I realised how many of the foreign teachers I work with here smoke. I wonder if people who are on the borderline are more likely to smoke if they live here…
Thanks for letting me know about the Math problem. You don’t use Safari do you? I know of an obscure bug with the Math plugin, but haven’t had any problems apart from that. I suspect you use Firefox, so this must be something new…
No, western expatriots don’t seem to smoke any more here than they do in the U.S. It all depends on how long they’ve been here though, I suppose.
Nope… I use Firefox. Today was the second time it happened, the first being about a week ago. Perhaps there’s an update for the plugin?
Hi RT,
Hmm, there goes that smoking theory…
I’ve checked the Math Comment Spam Protection Plugin home page and I have the latest version. I can’t find any mention of it not working. I’ll look into it further if I can. Please let me know if it happens again…
Just happen to stumble across this site… I found it interesting since I am heading to China next year for 2 weeks… after the Olympics thank goodness… will come back and visit again some day… take care