Regular readers of this column know I started writing a year ago about the experiences of new immigrants.
I haven't found anyone to interview in a while, but I have become involved with the Battlefords Immigrant Resource Centre. The contact led to my speaking with a Chinese immigrant, Michael, once a week to help him improve his English.
Maybe some time in the future I will interview him. But for now, I wanted to write about the conversations we have had.
Because Michael immigrated to Canada less than a year ago, culture is one of the most important topics of our conversation. He is, like most of our immigrants, in an unenviable position, having left behind a country where he grew up, has family and can communicate easily, for the cold unfamiliarity of Canada. Like many Chinese, he had some exposure to Western culture through TV shows like 24 and Friends, so mundane things like clothing and food were at least familiar.
But our culture - how we think about ourselves and our world - is wholly foreign. When we converse, I try to point out, as much as I'm able, the cultural differences that exist between Canadian and Chinese culture, and the reasons why those differences exist.
These differences are perhaps best emphasized in the stories we tell about our past. Stories shape our interpretation of present events and the future. Though we don't necessarily know them as "stories," much of the history we learn in school fits into these categories. I am speaking of European history, with its progression of monarchs, kingdoms, wars and, finally, countries, Canadian history, with its long line of rugged explorers, outposts and First Nations interaction, or even American history, with its early history of tiny settlements, war of independence, fragile unity and eventual world dominance. We can even go back to ancient Roman or Greek history, and see tiny reflections back into the present day - of the relationship the ancient Greeks and Romans had to their "barbarian" neighbours, for instance (barbarian being an ancient Greek word).
But we all know these stories. What stories do Chinese people tell about their country?
The earliest stories from the Middle Kingdom (since, back then, it wasn't called China) are very early indeed. As far back as a few centuries before the birth of Christ, the Chinese were already writing about dynasties that had ruled the area known as China for millennia. Canadians, Germans and Italians think of their country as a new thing - Canada acquired its independence only a few hundred years ago and Germany and Italy united into countries even more recently. But the idea of China as a single cultural and political entity goes back even before recorded history. The Xia Dynasty is the earliest example, and Chinese people still receive an education about the actions of its famous monarch, the virtuous king Yu. The Xia were succeeded by the Shang, who were overthrown by the Zhou, who gradually lost control of their kingdom during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods. And this chronology takes us only as far as about 200 BC; the Chinese cultural memory sees a single entity that survives (more or less) until the present day.
During almost all of its history, China was a cultural and intellectual juggernaut in the way that the United States is now. Talking to Michael, I learned he had enjoyed a wide variety of Western movies before coming to China, and of course, he has adopted Western-style dress like most of the world.
But for thousands of years, it was China that was the world's major cultural exporter, leaving the stamp of its language, religion, cuisine and intellectual culture on its neighbours. Japanese uses a writing system derived from Chinese characters, the Vietnamese language borrows much of its vocabulary from Chinese, and the influence of the Chinese language can be felt even further away.
Technologically, China was a juggernaut for thousands of years, creating the printing press four centuries before Gutenburg, paper 700 years before anyone else and, of course, gunpowder, along with grenades, landmines and multi-stage rockets. Even more dramatically is the fact the Chinese produced pig iron about 1,500 years before it was made in Europe. Culturally, the Chinese gave the world playing cards, restaurant menus, standardized testing and strong alcohol.
I could go on, but the point is China was a complex political and cultural entity and was, for thousands of years, one of the most advanced countries in the world. It then suffered several humiliating defeats from nations who would then have seemed to be upstarts, ceding Hong Kong to Britain, Macau to Portugal, and later losing parts of Northern China to Japan. In at least one of these conflicts, the Opium Wars, the Chinese had a clear moral superiority (fighting essentially to keep opium out of their country).
Canada is a young, fractious country. From studying history, we know that, had a few events occurred differently, we could have become a French colony, a collection of American states, or could have lacked Quebec, Newfoundland or the western provinces. The history of Canada as a political entity is, on a world scale, very new. This newness means we value individuals and structure our society accordingly.
China's stories and history have influenced the way Chinese people understand current events. When I asked Michael about separatist rumblings in the western Chinese state of Xinjiang, he explained China is like a family. Even though we might get into violent fights with our siblings, we don't abandon them. Speaking to him about China's one-child policy produced a response influenced by the same idea of China as a family.
I explained that some in the West think the one-child policy was a horribly immoral thing - leading to abortions, government coercion and a litany of other horrors. But he countered by explaining it was an entirely logical policy for a country struggling with overpopulation. The policy was not just good for the country, but good for individual families as well, as every family feels the effects of overpopulation. We in the West interpret the policy on the basis of the rights of individual parents, but Michael saw it more from the perspective of a country itself.
Sometimes we forget that every country on Earth has its own story, its own history. When we think of countries, we often think of how they are now, without remembering that country's citizens see their past as well. In China's case, Chinese citizens see a story of glory going back thousands of years, and the story of its recent loss (to newer countries like Britain and the United States).
I'll continue the theme in next week's column. If you're interested in volunteering with the Battlefords Immigrant Resource Centre, they can be reached at 446-0622.
