Opening my eyes to cultural stereotypes
In this week's The Good Life column, Gemma is challenging a number of cultural stereotypes...
The past few days I have seen quite a few airports and planes. Between going home to see my family and now sitting in Transylvania. I’m writing this from a place called ‘London Pub’ in the middle of Cluj-Napoca, Romania. Despite the name of the place, not one person is speaking English and I don’t know whether to feel scared or grateful.
Even though there is disco music thumping in the background, I put in my airpods and try to ignore what's happening around me. The place is empty, but I have a feeling this won’t be the case for too long. Each table has a tarnished gold 'reserved' sign on it, bags of ice are being drawn to the bar and barmaids are frantically preparing.
I can’t really grasp the vibe of the place. As people come in, they seem to be surprised to see somebody typing and drinking coffee. Can we please normalise going to bars/restaurants alone? And also going to a bar and not drinking alcohol!
Of all places Romania is probably a bit random. I am here as part of my internship. I am honestly loving it out here, I really enjoy mixing with people and getting to know more about their cultures. Everybody will go out tonight for drinks, which I am looking forward to but my social batteries are dwindling. I am itching to go for a walk or something (on my own of course) but I don’t really feel too safe doing so.
I probably shouldn’t have gone to a pub on my own but I needed to get away for a while. Work trips are strange in a nice way. Seeing people whom you normally see sitting at a desk behind a screen out enjoying themselves is funny.
At the same time it can be draining, we have a constant schedule to stick to and you start to feel a little like a cow being herded around a mart. I also don’t like not have the freedom to explore on my own, not because of the agenda but because the fear has been drilled into me.
When I informed the Cavan countryside that I would be hitting Romania, their eyes widened. I was asked why on earth I would go to Romania and I was asked to be careful, always watch my belongings, keep my head down, don’t speak to anybody and, whatever I did, do not give any money to people out begging for fear of being mobbed. Even the people I work with warned me to not leave anything unattended to the point that I felt nervous about coming.
So far, all of this is has been proven wrong. English is spoken in the shops and the native young people are only too happy to show you around their home. That said, I haven’t chanced going to the bathroom and leaving my stuff on the table, but you wouldn’t really do that anywhere nowadays would you?
A few days ago I was asked to do a video about breaking cultural stereotypes. Basically I had to explain where I was from, what I liked the most about my country, what I missed the most and finally describe a cultural stereotype I have discovered about my country while travelling. Easy!
From Ireland, I love Ireland’s landscapes particularly the coastlines and its greenness (and of course the people) and I miss Irish soda bread with all my heart (and my dog).
The stereotype part I found a little more difficult. I’ve come across a few, some hilarious and some completely untrue. People have asked me if it’s true that we all pinch each other on St Patrick’s day. I had never heard of it but maybe some people do and no there are no leprechauns in Ireland (that I have seen anyway). Another one I get is why I am so tanned even though I am Irish. No, we do not all have pale skin and red hair.
Why don’t you go out that much, aren’t you Irish? That's my personal favourite. Yes we have a strong drinking culture but that does not mean that we all enjoy getting wasted.
The one I went with was the tensions due to the Troubles between Ireland and the UK. I am often asked if we still hate the English, if there is still fighting, etc, etc. I said that this was completely untrue. Irish people do not hate English people.
The final question was what peace meant to me. Before moving to Belgium, I may have answered this differently but I said peace was a state where we could all accept each other’s cultures and live in harmony.
Discovering different cultures has really made me realise that we can discriminate against other people just because we do not understand why they do what they do. Travelling and meeting new people has opened my mind to this and it’s definitely for the better.
* Gemma Good is from Killeshandra and a third year journalism student in University of Limerick
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