The Contrast Between Chinese And German

  Since I began to learn German, I have gradually realized the vastly difference between Chinese and German in many dimension through myself and German teacher’s sayings. I am going to discuss the three things which are the most obvious and related to college students.

  Eating is the most important thing that supports human being to live. In Chinese, there are countless kinds of dishes, such as fried spring rolls, dumplings, pork chop with sweet and sour sauce, fried rice and fried noodles…etc, just like numerous and dense stars in the dark night. Likewise, there are also various ways to cook, for example, poach, pan-fry, stir-fry, steam, stew, braise…and so on. Different ways of cooking create variety of Chinese delicacies. By contrast, in Germany there are not as many dishes as in Chinese. German’s staple diets are salads, potatoes, and wheaten food, such as bread, noodles. A basket of bread, a dish of meat with mashed potato or French fries, a bowl of soup and a glass of drink are the most abundant meal in a day, and normally it is at dinner. More often than not, Germans only eat a sausage with bread as their lunch. Except lunch or dinner, Germans have cold food at the rest meals; unlike above, Chinese are used to have hot food at each meal. Appearance is the most crucial factor to judge a human at first. In Chinese, almost half of the students pay much attention on dressing, hair style, and make-up. Therefore, each student has their own fashion style. In the past few years, the trend of fashion is influenced by Japan and Korea. Obviously, no matter boys or girls in Taiwan, they all follow the foreign steps of fashion. However, in German, most of the students are not that concerned about dressing. A T-shirt, jeans, and a normal pair of sport shoes are fairly common on a German student. It does not mean that German student do not care about “fashion”. At the same time, we can also discover an interesting phenomenon - German adolescents do not like to have fringe, no matter full fringe or side fringe, because they think having fringe is too childish and unstaid. They would rather just have a simple hair style in order to look more mature and wiser than cut a fringe so as to look much younger and cuter. It is far from Chinese teenagers’ general notion. When Chinese mention the commonest amusement, most of the activities that come to their minds are indoor, such like shopping, going karaoke, hanging out with friends, going to watch movie, eating together…Although more and more people gradually love to go outing, mass of people still would like to stay indoor instead. Chinese people are always used to do everything together. Nevertheless, German people are fond of going to the beach, woods or riverside to enjoy the scene of nature. Outdoor pastimes – playing soccer, rowing a boat, driving a bike or lying on the grass to enjoy the genial sunshine are their usual recreations in their leisure time. People in Germany also enjoy being alone. They call those people who always stay alone “Einzelgänger”.

  Those national habitual behaviors of these two nations have their own value of existence. There are no “better” or “worse” nation. When we face the dissimilarity, we should esteem and tolerate it. Through continuing interaction, we can absorb their advantages and get out of our shortcomings. Make our country, our society and whole citizens scale the heights.