Evan sent me two videos recently that I thought were worth sharing here. Riley is the main subject and, in my opinion, it shows some insight into his unique personality and also demonstrates progress the kids have made in learning Chinese language and culture.
When Kammy and I say we want our kids to learn Chinese culture, I am not sure that this is what we had in mind, but nonetheless, I am still proud to see Riley sharing his observations in such a passionate way. In the first video taken in Beijing, Riley is saying that Chinese people are rude. They throw cigarette butts on the ground, spit, and push others. Reese also steps in to support the observation, and contrasts with how polite Canadians are.
I hope you don’t see this as Riley making racial stereotypes, what is shown in the video is much more than that. People in different parts of the world hold different values and what we consider rude or inappropriate may be well accepted in other cultures or by other generations. I think the observations made by Riley actually show the value of traveling and seeing how other people live. For this reason I was very proud to see this video. I thought it was quite funny how Riley does his best impression of “rude Chinese person”. Again, I don’t think that he is mocking Chinese people, but rather sharing a cultural difference that he has observed in his travels.
This second video is entirely in Cantonese, and again he is doing impersonations of the elderly people in Hong Kong (the way they laugh, snore, etc). I think it’s a good demonstration of how he’s picked up the language. I will also add that his language skills have improved dramatically since this video was taken in March.
As you can tell, Riley can be quite critical and sarcastic, something we hope to work with him on so that he doesn’t alienate others. He also has some pretty sharp observations and is able to articulate them quite well in multiple languages. He is a very unique and interesting young man.
