Intercultural Communication

My social circle is mainly made up of Chinese friends and there is usually no taboo in our conversations. Occasionally, we will unintentionally spurt out comments that maybe offensive to the other races. However, I have since learnt to be more conscious of the people around me during our conversations after the incident below.
I have a group of Chinese friends that I often meet up with. On one gathering few years back, one of my friends came back from overseas and brought along her boyfriend to meet us. Her boyfriend was a muslim. At that time, I did not realize the difference of having a muslim friend in our gathering. Initially, we had decided on a Chinese restaurant but my friend reminded us that we need to go to a Halal restaurant. The situation was awkward as I could see that her boyfriend was quite embarrassed and he kept apologizing that we have to change the dining location because of him. Throughout the dinner, we have to converse in English instead of Mandarin, our usual conversation language. In addition, I had to be constantly mindful of whatever I said in case he interpreted it as a racist remark against him. However, after a few more gatherings with him, we became more confortable with each other and were soon able to hit off well.
Singapore is a multi racial and multi cultural country and it is inevitable that we will meet people of different cultural backgrounds especially in the working society. It is important to observe the verbal language and non-verbal cues of other people and be more sensitive to them. Through this, we are able to bridge any cultural differences and communicate more efficiently.

Research Topic

“Making friends or Making out.” This is one of the article headlines in The Straits Times forum a few weeks ago. A writer wrote in to express her concern about the nature of orientation games that are being carried out in the universities. There have also been other articles reporting that university orientation games have taken a more sexual and lewd approach over the past few years. Gone are the days when seniors will bully the freshman and what comes in are forfeits that have more body contact between males and females. An example of such forfeits is asking a male student to do pushups on a female student. This brings up the question whether this kind of orientation games should be allowed to carry on? Or should school advisors step in to regulate these activities?

The aim of orientation is to allow freshman to meet new friends in their university life. The Social Development Unit also makes use of this opportunity to promote more interaction between male and female students. However, encouraging interactions between the genders through this kind of physical and sexual games may not be desirable. Attraction between the genders may become more of a physical attraction rather than base on an individual character.

I have been through as a freshman and senior in orientation. In my opinion, orientation games are indeed more and more daring and physical. Such games can really add more spice and laughter to the camp and boost the spirits of the campers. However, I have to agree that there are still conservative students who deem these games unacceptable. Unfortunately, they often have to participate in such games to prevent being labeled as spoil sport.

To answer the research questions, surveys can be targeted at freshman and also students that are about to enter university life. Since these students are the ones who will have been through or going to participate in the orientation, it is important that their views are being taken into consideration.