Maria -- CP 5 and critical incident

On our 5th meeting Lu gives me a cute little necklace she's brought from China. She tells me she has brought a few tokens like this in order to show her thankfulness to those who would help her in this new and foreign country. To me this is a very nice thing to do, and I smile when she makes a big point about wanting to bring to the US something "made in China". The true big point for me is that she feels that I've been of help to her. (In fact, I decided then to give her a small token in return. It was fairly difficult to find something actually made in the US, but I did, and the whole process of looking for this little object made me think about how much I myself have learned from this tutoring experience, and how glad I am to have done it).

During our conversation, Lu tells me about a problem a friend of hers has had with her CP. They had gone to Orlando on a trip, but at some point a heated discussion had broken out between them. So heated in fact, that Lu's friend had stormed out on her CP. The topic seems to have been China or Chinese politics. Lu cannot explain it very clearly, but the bottom line is that the CP showed a tremendous lack of respect for China and its people and "knows nothing (Lu's words -- I decide it is not the right time to interrupt with some grammatical prudery) ... like all Americans." Ouch! But, the story gets better. After Lu's friend takes off and does not come back for a while, her CP calls the police on her (!!). At this point of the story Lu is fuming: "stupid, stupid, stupid" she repeats in disbelief. Well, I venture to interject, if the CP could not find your friend and they were in Orlando on a trip, maybe calling the police was the only thing to do? "She could have called my friend on her cell-phone" comes Lu's quick reply. "My friend's CP is stupid," she concludes.

In the end things got straightened out and the police let both Lu's friend and her CP go. From Lu's explanation it is not clear to me what really happened, but it seems (to me) that a cultural misunderstanding was at the root of this incident and that the police got needlessly involved. It sounds like a perfect critical incident to me, so I ask Lu what she thinks about it. In her opinion, one should not speak without knowing what they are talking about and that Americans have a tendency to do so. She finds Americans to be over confident in their beliefs (she mentions other examples) and thinks they should listen and learn before they start preaching to others. (Sounds like a familiar complaint). She herself prefers to be quiet rather than open her mouth before knowing enough about the subject being discussed. She adds that this is the proper thing to do in China, where society and the language itself recommend that you measure your words. So, we continue, trying to compare both cultures on this topic, and pretty soon the hour is over.