First Blog Post

While reading the first 25 pages, I came across issues relating to culture and culture conflicts. One of the very first culture issues was the role of women and what should be expected of them. On one side of China women are free to marry and divorce who that want to but on the other side of China it is not their choice. The amount of freedom and respect that women get varies greatly between the two sides. Hessler gives a good example of how women are viewed in Chinese culture when he describes a teacher tying her jacket around her waist. The students looked at the teacher oddly because they were not used to a woman removing any article of clothing in front of them. From Hessler's view, as well as many other Americans, there was nothing wrong with a person removing an article of clothing in public as long as it's not revealing any private areas. Living in an area with such strick customs and a very prominent culture, Hessler had to get used to doing things their way. One thing I found very reward was that when Hessler would do something his way without noticing that he isn't following their custom the teachers were willing to help him fix his mistake in a nice manner. That shows that despite their culture difference they are willing to help Hessler learn their culture so that he wouldn't have to learn it the hard way on his own.