Cultural Differences(revised)

Cultural Differences

This summer vacation, I work on a volunteer for a Chinese intensive program, where I met a lot of foreigners. After getting along with them for a month, I found that they were very kind and we became good friends. They often told me much about their lives in Germany, and I discovered that people in Taiwan and Germany have different concepts about education, family, and sexual equality.

First, education in Germany is more flexible than in Taiwan. Parents do not ask their children to try hard to get high grades. Instead, they encourage their children to join clubs and exercise. For them, the most important thing is that their children have wonderful childhoods. Moreover, German students seldom go to cram schools. They only go there for more knowledge, not for grades. For instance, if they want to learn how to play the piano, they will go to cram schools to learn it. However, parents in Taiwan always ask their children to study hard. Parents will tell their children that if they don’t attend good universities, they will be losers in the future. Furthermore, parents seldom want their children to join extracurricular activities and some of them even think they will waste time. Most importantly, most students in Taiwan go to cram schools every day, but the reason they go there is not for leaning what they like but for getting good grades.

Second, German don’t emphasize on the importance of families. After they are eighteen, it’s common for them to move out and make money by themselves. Besides, they won’t consider taking care of parents as their duties. For example, once I asked my German friend whether he wanted to live with his parents, and he seemed very surprised. He said that he is independent and can deal with everything , so his parents won’t interfere in his decisions or ask him to do something for them. However, family is very important in Taiwan. Taiwanese usually take filial piety for granted, and they look after their parents even when they move out or be married. What’s more, their parents give them advice even they are independent. Take my cousin for example. He is twenty seven but still lives with his parents. He gives them money, listens to their opinions, and concerns about them. He is a typical filial child in Taiwan.

Third, people in Germany stress the importance of sexual equality. In Germany, they don’t have sexual discrimination and treat everyone equally. Therefore, many women go out to work and earn money to raise her families. Also, it’s easy for women to be promoted if they do the jobs well. Moreover, men and women will do the housework together. Instead of asking women to do all the housework, they think that people who have more free time should do the housework. However, some Taiwanese still don’t have the concept of sexual equality. For instance, some people believe that women should stay at home to take care of children and do all the housework.Besides, if men and women also do well on the jobs, it is men who usually get promoted. Sometimes when women become managers, people won’t be happy for them but say that they must be workholics. On the contrary, if men are managers, people will say that they have good abilities.

There are many cultural differences between Taiwan and Germany, especially in the areas of education, family, and sexual equality. Although we have a lot of different concepts, every culture is unique. Because of cultural differences, our world is wonderful.