Concept Barriers

Everyone understands the idea of a language barrier, and we blame a lot of things on it.  We are never quite sure how much of what we say is understood by those we are talking to, as the students certainly speak way better English than I do Chinese, but they are not fluent by any means.  The tendency here when they don't understand something is to nod and smile, which unfortunately makes it difficult to tell whether they have understood or not.  Today, however, Adam and I had an experience which illustrates to me something further than just a language barrier, but more of a concept barrier.  Not only are Chinese people different in the language in which they talk and think, but their very ideas and mental constructs are different than ours.  They build their picture of the world differently than we do, and thus different things make sense and have meaning than for us.  This is certainly true for all of the world's cultures, I am just using Chinese people as an example since I am here.

Today we went with one of the Chinese graduate students named Changyan to the campus of the Peking Union Medical College for another stab at obtaining the last necessary form for our residence permits.  That whole endeavor, which took most of the morning, was completely unsuccessful, which is a completely different story (think: foiled again due to being an illiterate foreign pawn in a power struggle between the Chinese police and China's greatest medical school).  However, before returning to the institute, Changyan mentioned that there was a telephone promotion with China Mobile, our phone company, that she wanted to investigate.  It turns out if you put varying amounts of credit on  your SIM card, you could get different free gifts, up to a new bicycle for 500 RMB, which is about $75.  Since I needed a new bicycle anyway, this was a deal impossible to pass up, as that will be enough phone credit for the whole year and that is about the price of a cheap bike at home - 2 for the price of 1!.  Changyan wanted a new bike too, and we struggled through the paperwork together, emerging triumphantly with new bicycles wrapped in plastic and cardboard.

And then the fun began...Adam and I both assumed that we would keep them in their packing, unassembled, in order to either carry them on to the bus (difficult) or put them in the trunk of a taxi (easy, but more expensive) and return to the institute.  Changyan, however, kept insisting that we find someone to put them together.  We tried to explain that it would be easier to return with them disassembled, but she insisted that we had new bikes and we need to put them together.  At first I thought maybe she didn't understand, but she had had almost no trouble understanding us so far today and the idea of the concept barrier was born.  Perhaps carrying around bikes in packages is just not done, or it seemed heavy and easier to handle once assembled.  Regardless, we stopped in the street, she called someone she knew in the area and we found the closest bike repair guy.  We dropped our bikes off, went to lunch in the nearby mall, and returned to assembled (albeit poorly, her brakes don't even work) bikes.

My new bike, complete with remaining plastic

And then reality hit - how were we going to return home?  The roads between the med school and our institute are all major arteries, very dangerous for inexperienced bikers with no helmets or Chinese skills, and Changyan did not feel comfortable either.  We tried the metro - bikes rejected.  She didn't have a map and wasn't sure how to get home.  We paused in uncertainty on the street for several long moments - what to do?  The bus driver was sure to reject us passage as well.  At last, we decided to go the begging route - Changyan got on the bus and pulled the "we got new bikes and we're lost and we are scared to ride on the street please let us on the bus" routine...and after several long moments, the bus monitor agreed.  We were saved!  Getting on the bus with the bike was the worst part...bus starts moving, bikes start rolling...you get the idea...but after a bit we got the hang of holding on to everything and it was really much easier than riding back, especially since that might have involved following the bus until we lost it, then waiting for the next one, since we didn't know how to get back!

The whole thing worked out, but it has made me think about the idea of a concept barrier - I'm sure there are better examples, but this is a small one, and one that certainly impacted my day!  I feel like concept barriers are harder to overcome than language barriers, because even if I learn Chinese I still won't have the cultural background of the Chinese or think like a Chinese person.  I think being aware of it is the first step to avoiding misunderstanding, but the barriers certainly bode for many interesting experiences in the year to come!

But, I did get a bike out of the deal.  So altogether not too bad ;)