{"id":2741,"date":"2014-04-04T11:35:34","date_gmt":"2014-04-04T09:35:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/?p=2741"},"modified":"2015-10-28T17:34:53","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T15:34:53","slug":"absolutely-intercultural-177-intercultural-complexity-and-simplicity-vietnam-finland-and-germany-differences-in-everyday-cultural-conventions-culture-shocks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/?p=2741","title":{"rendered":"Absolutely Intercultural 177 +++ Intercultural Complexity and Simplicity +++ Vietnam, Finland, and Germany +++ Differences in Everyday Cultural Conventions +++ Culture Shocks +++"},"content":{"rendered":"<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-2741-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/podcast\/absolutely_intercultural_show_177.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/podcast\/absolutely_intercultural_show_177.mp3\">http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/podcast\/absolutely_intercultural_show_177.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p>If you like the podcast then please also LIKE US ON <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AbsolutelyIntercultural\">FACEBOOK<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Indochine057traffic-jam-web.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-2748\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Indochine057traffic-jam-web.jpg\" alt=\"Indochine057traffic jam web\" width=\"278\" height=\"235\" \/><\/a>Our current exchange students from Vietnam and Lithuania are here in Germany studying and doing their internships. Within their first days after their arrival, they mentioned some cultural differences concerning the complexity and simplicity in their new lives and in their home countries. Cultural anthropologists have discovered and described differences in the level of <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Complexity\" target=\"_blank\">cultural complexity<\/a> in various parts of the world. But \u2013 as we know \u2013 the understanding of such a difficult and complicated phenomenon is not the same if you just read about it. Traveling around the world and getting in touch with many different cultures is probably the best way to understand how cultures &#8211; and especially cultural conventions &#8211; differ from country to country. <!--more--> <\/p>\n<p>The grade of complexity of different cultures is difficult to measure &#8211; but perhaps quite easy to &#8220;feel out&#8221; when you are in that culture for the first time. Is it safe to assume that &#8220;older&#8221; cultures have developed more complexity? Is this a one-way street and do cultures become more and more complex over the centuries a little bit like our tax-law seems to be getting more and more complex because politicians discover loop-holes and try to add new rules to fix them?<\/p>\n<p><strong>absolutely different<\/strong><br \/>\nGia and Ahn, both native Vietnamese, studying in Finland and right now spending a semester abroad in Germany have had the opportunity to make a number of intercultural experiences. I asked them which intercultural differences they noticed first after their arrival to Europe \u2013 and if they maybe even have felt a \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Culture_shock\" target=\"_blank\">culture shock<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n<p><strong>absolutely polite<\/strong><br \/>\nI interviewed two students &#8211; Simas from Lithuania and Tatjana from Germany and we got talking about what it means to be hospitable to your guests. If you offer food and they say \u201cNo thank you\u201d, would you ask them again in your culture?<\/p>\n<p><strong>absolutely life-changing<\/strong><br \/>\nWe asked ourselves whether spending a long time in different countries \u2013 getting used to different cultural habits &#8211; may change your appreciation of your own native cultural conventions?<br \/>\nGia and Anh have spent their holidays back home \u2013 in Vietnam \u2013 after spending a long time in Europe. I asked them if there was anything that made them feel uncomfortable in their \u201chome-culture\u201d \u2013 after such a long time of absence. Gia had a bit of a culture shock when her Mum and her friends gave her a lift on the scooter. All of a sudden the traffic in <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ho_Chi_Minh_City\" target=\"_blank\">Ho-Chi-Minh City<\/a> looked very frightening to her, too noisy and too crowded \u2013 in a word: too complex.<\/p>\n<p>Our next show will be coming to you from Anne Fox in Denmark on 2nd of May.<\/p>\n<p>Until then \u2013<br \/>\nBleiben Sie absolut interkulturell!<\/p>\n<p>And please visit our\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AbsolutelyIntercultural\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook page<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The host of this show is:\u00a0<a title=\"Laurent Borgmann\" href=\"http:\/\/www.laurent-borgmann.de\/\" target=\"_blank\">Dr. Laurent Borgmann<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Editor: Younes Jaber<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/poddownico.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"20\" height=\"20\" border=\"0\" \/>\u00a0<a title=\"Download the show\" href=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/podcast\/absolutely_intercultural_show_177.mp3\" target=\"_blank\">Download<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/podfeedico.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"20\" height=\"20\" border=\"0\" \/>\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/absolutely-intercultural\" target=\"_blank\">Podcast-Feed<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/podaboico.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"20\" height=\"20\" border=\"0\" \/>\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/phobos.apple.com\/WebObjects\/MZStore.woa\/wa\/viewPodcast?id=137617215&amp;s\" target=\"_blank\">iTunes-Abo<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"More...\" src=\"http:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/wp-includes\/js\/tinymce\/plugins\/wordpress\/img\/trans.gif\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you like the podcast then please also LIKE US ON FACEBOOK! Our current exchange students from Vietnam and Lithuania are here in Germany studying and doing their internships. Within their first days after their arrival, they mentioned some cultural differences concerning the complexity and simplicity in their new lives and in their home countries. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/?p=2741\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Absolutely Intercultural 177 +++ Intercultural Complexity and Simplicity +++ Vietnam, Finland, and Germany +++ Differences in Everyday Cultural Conventions +++ Culture Shocks +++&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[21,883,885,5,880,478,888,886,285,887,81,882,881,997,73,814,884,879,813],"class_list":["post-2741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast","tag-absolutely-intercultural","tag-complexity","tag-cultural-shock","tag-culture","tag-dr-laurent-borgmann","tag-english","tag-english-podcast","tag-everyday-cultural-practices","tag-finland","tag-german","tag-germany","tag-intercultural-complexity","tag-intercultural-simplicity","tag-podcast","tag-rheinahrcampus","tag-rheinahrcampus-remagen","tag-shock","tag-vietnam","tag-younes-jaber"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2741"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3211,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741\/revisions\/3211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.absolutely-intercultural.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}