Conversation Partner Reflection - #5

The day before Cindy and I met, my dad called me and wanted me to ask Cindy about a Chinese wine he had received from a client.  He texted me a picture, and I told him I would ask Cindy about it.

Cindy and I met, and I proceeded to show her a picture of the bottle, the accompanying glasses and the box.  She indicated to me that it was not wine but rather one of the strongest liquors in China.  She told me that it is to be drunk by men at a meal and that the glasses are small for a reason…

This quick discussion prompted me to ask about the drinking customs in her culture.  I wrongly assumed that their rules and customs would be similar to ours.  I thought that the drinking age would be 21 considering their rules on pregnancy.  Cindy shared with me that their drinking age was similar to the rest of the world and was set at 18.

She said that there is a lot of peer pressure around drinking.  I found that peer pressure was one of the biggest similarities between our drinking customs.  She said that within her friend group she was encouraged to drink even if she didn’t want to.  I found her situation to be similar to college parties – where it can seem unacceptable to be sober.

She talked about the differences between genders when it comes to drinking.  I learned that it is more acceptable for men to drink than for women in most social situations.  It surprised me when she said that she would never drink in front over her parents.  She told me that only her dad would drink when company was over, her mother would never drink.  The concept of having a beer or a glass of wine in front over her parents seemed unfathomable, unlike many families in the States.

While I originally thought that our drinking customs would be fairly similar, I realized that their drinking customs were bound to be different if their eating habits and their treatment of elders differs from ours.  Reflecting on our past conversations, it makes sense that drinking is typically done in communal settings since their eating habits are communal as well.  Since the Chinese seem to have a more formal respect towards their elders, I see that it may be culturally inappropriate to consume alcohol in their presence.

While I expected Cindy to have some sort of experience similar to our tailgates, in relation to alcohol consumption, reflecting on the Chinese cultural practices and traditions has helped me understand why their drinking customs differ so widely from ours.