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A Trip Stateside

Angela Joy Quilang-Balod

Being stuck in quarantine has made me miss a lot of things, as well as miss going to far off places to see or experience those said things. I’ve been especially missing travelling to New Jersey and staying with my aunt for the summer. The “Garden State”, as the name suggests, is a place I associate not only with lush greenery and wildflowers, but also the peace and freedom that let me experience and learn new things.

I’ve been recording all my trips to America, but in this post I’ll be writing about my most recent trip there which was in the summer of 2017. It had already been my third visit, but I was still excited to get away from the regular hustle and bustle. Once we got some sleep and got settled in my aunt’s apartment, we did what we usually did on days when we didn’t have places to be - we took a walk down to the brook. On other days we also visited forest parks to enjoy the local flora and get some more exercise. I noticed that while there was still litter in the nature areas, Americans seemed to appreciate forests and greenery better than Filipinos. In the quiet town my aunt used to live in, I didn’t see a lot of people in the unusually quiet mall. It was a stark contrast to the malls back home, which blasted music and was almost always full of noisy people. Despite this, it was relieving to know that Americans could be just as cordial as Filipinos. We visited some family friends in a different town and attended a church service there. The congregation’s hospitality was a bit of a culture shock to me, because we’d barely interacted with anyone else other than fellow Filipinos. We had been used to keeping a formal demeanor whenever we were outside for fear of being looked down upon due to us being people of color. However, at church, I felt like I was in an American movie. They were good at making us feel like we belonged, even if we only stayed for a day. It really just felt like socializing back at home (except in English). The rest of the trip was filled with visits to New York City and historical sites, as well as relaxing at the apartment while watching Netflix.

There is a certain kind of joy that comes from knowing that no matter where in the world you may be, the people there share the same humanity as you. This goes for people coming from the differing high-context and low-context cultures. American culture falls under Hall’s (1990) description of a low-context culture, as there aren’t many special cultural rituals whenever they interact, and communication is direct. While at our church here in the Philippines I would “mano” to older relatives and family friends, I would simply need to smile at other friendly churchgoers no matter their age. Despite the differences in these situations your presence is still appreciated and enjoyed in both. I’d say that American culture only becomes high-context when one is a person of color in what is most likely a racist environment. What Filipinos would consider normal and happy (and what most white Americans would consider as normal and happy if it was someone of their race), like laughing loudly or goofing around, is often considered improper and unbecoming. When eating in Italian restaurants we are advised to talk with each other in English despite the loud Italian conversations heard behind the counter, as we might be suspected of speaking bad things about them. There is an implicit knowledge that we are judged more critically than your average white family. 

I love visiting New Jersey, because even if there isn’t anything “touristy” to do, I’d take in the clean, fragrant air and revel in the serenity it brought. But other than that it also brings a deeper understanding of interracial and intercultural communities, and how America is still far off from the tolerant and accepting community it wants to be perceived as. This understanding can help us improve our communities back in the Philippines as we judge for ourselves how far we’ve come from our own prejudices.

Reference:

Hall, E. (1990). Understanding Cultural Differences. Intercultural Press, Inc. New York.

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My Trip to Japan

Elijah Jose G. Faylona

My family has made it somewhat of a tradition to travel every summer, whether it be a local trip or abroad. My personal favorite trip is our second trip to Japan. I was quite young during our first trip to Japan so I wasn’t able to fully appreciate the differences in culture. Our second trip was during the summer of 2019. By then I was already 18 and I was able to see all the differences in culture now that I was older. So, in this post I am going to describe what I saw and experienced during that trip.

This particular trip was a request of mine. I was going to graduate the next year so my parents let me pick where I wanted to go for the family trip. At the time I was very interested in Japanese culture due to my exposure to anime and manga, which are Japanese cartoons and comics respectively. I was so excited for the trip and I couldn’t wait to go. We landed in Tokyo and I could already see how different the environment was. Everything seemed much more fast-paced yet organized than the airport at home. It was efficient and people were direct to the point. So, we got our luggage and headed for our hotel, which just so happened to be in the Disney resort. I was amazed by the hotel because it was a blend of both Japanese and American culture. The architecture was western and yet there were certain hints of Japanese culture there with the abundance of flowers and other motifs. We left our luggage in the hotel and explored Tokyo. Now my first culture shock was when I got to the train station. In the Philippines, I grew accustomed to slow trains which sometimes arrived late. Imagine my surprise when I saw that the trains in Japan were not only fast, but extremely punctual. It made me wonder if we would even have traffic jams if we had such efficient transportation systems. We got on a train and headed to Central Tokyo. My family wanted to go shopping. We were fortunate enough that my mother spoke Japanese so we had a translator at hand to make the shopping easier. What I did notice when we were shopping was that the Japanese had a different way of paying for things. Here in the Philippines, we simply hand over the bills to the cashier, but in Japan there is a tray for you to put the money in. After receiving the money from the tray, the cashier bows a little towards you. I believe this is a symbol of respect for the money since the Japanese are a very frugal culture. The next culture shock I received was when we went to a Japanese grill for dinner. As you may know, Japan is a very technologically advanced country. In this restaurant there were no waiters. We ordered our food from an iPad. This in of itself was amazing to me because this was the first time, I’d seen a restaurant with this ordering system. I thought that someone would bring out our food later but instead I saw that the food came to the side of a table through a conveyor belt. We had to open the window next to our table and grab the food. I was absolutely astonished by the system and wished we had something like this in the Philippines. The rest of our trip we went shopping some more in notable parts of the city such as Akihabara and Shinjuku. Here I saw that the Japanese traffic and pedestrian culture was very different from what we have at home. The Japanese actually follow the rules. This is of course due to the Japanese having a high value on order and discipline.

I enjoyed every second of my trip to Japan. Despite Tokyo not being the most cultural city to visit in Japan, I was still able to see the differences in Japanese and Filipino culture. Japan is a high context culture. A high context culture as defined by Hall (1990) is a culture that relies on implicit and non-verbal cues in communication. This is seen in the way the Japanese hold your non-verbal cues to you. If you do the wrong thing, you may be branded as disrespectful. It was important for us to learn these non-verbal cues in Japan as to not look disrespectful. Bowing is the most notable example of this. It is a sign of respect among the Japanese and by bowing you show that you respect them as well. In the Philippines we also have a high context culture but are different in the ways that we show it. We bless each other as a sign of respect and it is expected that families in the Philippines are close-knit, which is the same in Japan. Another difference I noticed between Japanese and Filipino culture is how westernized we are compared to them. Yes, Japan is also a westernized country but they were able to keep their cultural identity. It is a blend of Japanese and Western culture. You can see this in how many of the shops in Japan sell local goods rather than Western goods. This is something I envy from the Japanese. I wish that our culture would also put emphasis on local goods rather than imported ones, but that is not the case. When you go to the Philippines, you see foreign businesses everywhere with the local business here and there.  There were however similarities in the communication habits of the Japanese and Filipinos. Here in the Philippines as stated by Maggay (2002), Filipino cultures have certain habits when it comes to communication, including getting a message across in an indirect manner, using a third party to get information across, putting across a good demeanor as to not offend the person, having argumentative forms of conversation, and reporting the news to someone when communicating. The values I mentioned are the ones that the Japanese and Filipinos have in common. The Japanese when communicating with someone like to do so in an indirect manner or if possible, with a third-party present. The Japanese often use confrontational and argumentative language so they use these same values stated by Maggay to prevent any offense to the other person. The Japanese have a strong concept of socialization so to them every relationship is important. There are some key differences however. Maggay (2002) also stated that Filipinos tend to project their feelings in conversation and like to show off to the other person. This is not the case in Japanese culture. With the Japanese, conversation is very formal and business oriented so such behavior can be seen as unprofessional.  

So, what did I learn of Japanese culture from my trip there? I learned that our cultures are similar in many ways but at the same time different. We hold similar values but express them in different ways. I think that there is a lot we can learn from the Japanese and maybe the Japanese can learn from us. We should hold the same value of order as the Japanese but not to the point that it is too much. We need that sense of efficiency that the Japanese have so that we could be able to progress as a nation more. Finally, we should have that sense of respect when we speak to each other that the Japanese do instead of having disrespectful communication sometimes. It shows that you respect that other person and that they should respect you as well.

References:

Hall, E. (1990). Understanding Cultural Differences. Intercultural Press, Inc. New York.

Maggay, M.P. (2002). Pahiwatig: Kagawiang pangkomunikasyon ng Filipino. Quezon City, Philippines: Ateneo de Manila University Press.