Cultural Exchange between East-West on Adolescence

Hi Shela

Nice meeting you via email. I am a year 1 student of the PsyD program taught by Dr Zelm, and in my early thirties. Currently I am doing research with patients who first experience psychosis in a teaching hospital. I am very happy to have got your email so soon! I was intended to email you yesterday but Dr Zelm said wait a while until your professor has announced about this first.

The idea of talking to real people from a different background on the other side of the world is very exciting indeed!

How would you describe / consider the impact of (i -> iii) in your adolescence?
i) your intellectual growth: any important decision made during your adolescence that you still feel a great impact now?
ii) your parents
iii) your peer (white and black Americans)


Instructions from Dr Zelm:
"Below, you will see that you have been paired with a USA “partner” for this assignment. All students are in the PsyD program, and most are in their first year. They are also taking Lifespan Development on-line with another instructor. They use the same textbook but they have different readings and assignments. They are of all ages (25 to 55 years), level of clinical experience, ethnicity (Caucasian, African American, Asian) and many live far from California, so they are a fairly diverse group. We ask you and your USA partner to initiate e-mail contact during the week of 6 November and to discuss your adolescent experiences, based on your assignment from last week. Both classes have read the same article on the stages of adolescence, and both classes completed the same assignment. "


a. What did you learn about the adolescent experience of your partner?

b. What similarities and differences do you note with your own?

c. If possible based on what you have learned from your partner, consider what might account for these differences, such as: nationality, age, ethnicity/race, gender, socioeconomic status, family relationships.

d. Please comment on this experience – interesting/not interesting, useful/not useful, fun/stressful? Any other comments?


My first partner is an Indian American who was born in India and immigrated to America with her parents when she was one year old. She was raised in America and grew up with Americans peers (White and Black) and had very few Indian peers.

Our parents were quite involved in both of our lives from childhood through adulthood. She experienced this importance in her strong attachment with her parents. She also experienced this importance in her choice of interest and subjects to take during her adolescence. She would rather have a good relationship with her parents and so after a few fights , she gradually grew out of it without their support. Her parents later on felt quite guilty of not being supportive of her in her early teens about drama.

My parents have also been very involved in my life from childhood through adulthood, and in much similar ways as hers: during my adolescence, in my choice of interest and academic subjects that had great implication on my future career. The key difference was that I experienced this as their authority as parents over me as their adolescent child, rather than a sense of strong attachment like my US partner.

I also did not fight much and maintained a harmonious relationship with my parents as much as possible, however, I continued or persevered with my choice quietly, secretly, and delayed its expression until years later. After from those 2 areas, and about religions, my parents did give me much freehand as well regarding choice of friends, and how to spend my time, and can happily tolerate separation for the sake of better education during my adolescence like my US partner.


Both of us were not rebellious in our adolescence, even though due to difference reasons, and this may be due to our cultural background that stress a lot on the importance of family in one’s life. I guess, for my US partner, she is getting the benefits of both cultures, a tradition of close family-ties from Indian culture, and the willingness to overtly express love and affection between family members in the American culture, and that forms her basis of strong attachment with her parents.

For me, my Chinese cultural background formed the basis of me trying to keep a harmonious relationship in the traditional power structure of a Chinese family: parents have the authority as seniors in the family, and children’s role is to obey. That was why I did not rebel overtly with my parents. However, as emotions or affections were not usually expressed between family members, I experience more distance and hierarchy in my child-parent relationship, and so less attachment than my US partner.

I have never realized my lack of attachment with my parents in the midst of such harmonious and trusting relationships within my family. Not until I have this assignments and when I talked with others. I got this impression too from my comparison with my other US partner too. And that is why this has given me a profound impact. I have to re-think again about the impact of my few struggles with my parents and also I have never realized that I am in a child-parent hierarchy inherited from my cultural background and that it does have an impact on my emotional feelings and relationship with my parents.


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My second partner is of English and Irish descent and grew up in a rural community’s lower-middle class family.

I shared with her independence from peer pressure because we both felt not being part of our peer groups, only for different reasons. She felt indifferent to her peer’s existence and like more in her private world. I, too, stayed in my private world, part of it like her because of not being understood, did not share our peer’s interests, like popular music, but I was more because of the alienation I felt from my peers who were mostly in the upper socioeconomic class. My US partner did not felt the impact of social class in social relationships in US.

My alienation also came from the superiority in academic achievements of my peers who came from the upper class family. While there was neither little competition nor challenging work involved in my US partner’s school years, academic merits meant a lot to the students at my secondary school. I felt left alone while my US partner felt indifferent to her peers. I developed my own reliance system, struggling hard to accept my weakness academically but that I had other strengths in more subtle ways, and gradually stayed out of the competition among my student peers. Some of my peers built up strong friendships with me because I came from a different part of the world from them and so there was no obvious competition between us and we can stay quite independent of each other and yet trusting and harmonious with each other.

The difference in our puberty experience is firstly physical, and secondly cultural, I guess. I just happened to have a late, smooth and physically insignificant puberty as compared to my US partner. Diet and genes may contribute to that difference. But the impact of the physical change on our psychological well-being might be very different if I were to go through her traumatic change.

It could be that I came from a cultural background that stress a lot on academic merits and personal achievement, competitively, and where physical appearance, although important to any adolescent, can at most come second, after achievements. I might have less of an impact on my self-perception given my social background and expectation. Personal excellence did had a high impact on my peer relationships during my adolescence, much more than my US partner. I guess this might be better understood as the difference between rural and cosmopolitan upbringing, plus that Asian parents usually put more emphasis on academics than American parents, than purely cultural.

One very nice surprise in this exchange is that I run into somebody who loves Ballet as well. I also danced over 15 years, quitted very reluctantly and felt such a lost of personal identity and emotional attachment too when I quitted it. I have never shared with anybody regarding this lost, as I have always thought that it was a bit obscure and sounds obsessive to me. We wrote at length about the lost and the emotional imbalance we went through. I also found running as a substitute too. In recent years, I tried Flamingo dancing, and she has recently restarted Ballet. We felt more at peace with some kind of dancing even after we had quitted for over a decade now. It brought me such a great relief regarding my lost of Ballet as I can talk with her without the fear of being obscure or what. Only when I put this in writing and have a listening ear, an echoing person, I experience a relief that I had never known of. I never know that I still feel the lost of it, not until I talked with her.

Thank you for the very insightful assignment. It was indeed unexpectedly insightful for me.

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When I was young...younger

a home gal, stay close to my family

I have been staying with my family like most people all through my childhood and even now. I was only away from my family, when I did my first degree in UK. After that 3 years of overseas study, I came back home to do my research degrees.

as a little gal

When I was 10 to 12, physically and psychosocially, I was still very much in my childhood. I stayed as my parents?good girl at home, and mainly depended on their recognition and affection until 12. My dependence on my family for social support dropped significantly when I went to secondary school at 13 years old.

Ballet... my Ballet

Ballet meant a lot to me too. I started at 3 and continued until 18. There was 2-3 years that I had to stop because of some blood disease at 6-8. I got back to it as soon as the doctor allowed me to do so. At about 13, my father read from a newspaper by some Chinese bone doctor saying that Ballet dancing is hazardous to bone growth in girls, my father started to object it strongly. I did not comply, and everytime I need to pay the dance tuition fees, he would say this and that, until I decided to get some small jobs to pay myself. He stopped paying it as a material way of objection too. But I had already got myself a few freelance jobs as primary children's private tutor. I have to work around 6 hrs/week to pay for the fees, and the point shoes. They broke/worn out so quickly, I had to keep buying them.


End of my Ballet life


I had this very strong and (to me) strange feeling (as I had not got anyone to talk to, I didn't know if it is normal or not) of the lost of personal identity too when I quitted at 18. It was a very difficult decision for me, and a decision that I cannot quite accept. I kind of have a strong sense of shame to quit it, although I told myself that this was nothing shameful I have done, after so many years of perserverance and hard work. I had at a certain point, very briefly, but kind of seriously and secretely (privately), of doing dancing as a career.

But I had the sense to know that my talent was not enough (far below) to make this a career, and it was impossible for me (even more so for my parents) to image NOT furthering my studies after high school and just dance. On the other hand, I really had NOT got any other thing that I commit so much of myself into that it is like all of my life apart from studying. I did not realize how it had gradually become part of me in the process of sweating, stretching, bleeding (I always bleed after dancing with the point shoes over 40mins, I had a strange foot shape and I still had not got right my shoes after buying many of them....), all the failures and the little success in overcoming bit by bit (this position, this step..oh I can do it with more grace now..etc), forsaking time and money just for Ballet.

Can't face quiting Ballet

I guess my character of 'fighting my own battles silently, alone, in perseverance' developed through the long years of Ballet. When I quit, I still could not overcome some barriers in Ballet, even after much much effort, partly because of a bad teacher in my first 12 years of dancing, and also because of the shape of my feet.

• Even though I was not a very good dancer, my identity as a sincere and delicated Ballet student (privately) has get rooted deep inside. I just did not quite know who I was, and what I was to do..like I get light-headed and can't balance myself without this identity and this habit and this passion. I did not tell anyone that I quitted it. I didn't, not even my friends and my family.

• I remembered I even lied about it when I got caught by a nosy relative, who wasn't able to find me at my Ballet school and people told her that I'd quitted quite some time already. To me it was such an unacceptable decision made by myself, and such an unacceptable lost of identity, lost of my life, and I just can't face this lost and this shame.

After Ballet --> Jogging --> Flamenco

I turned to running ah after I quitted Ballet............. I just found that I can run for a long time ( I know this must be from the hardship in Ballet), and so I can easily got medals at school for 400m, 800m without training.

• So I just hide/rest in this sport afterwards. I even got into a cross-country college team later and get some training and races experience on it. But I am not very good, I just follow what I was trained or told to by the coaches and the team members. And we were quite a close team at that time. I was in my early twenties.
• I never liked or good at ball games. I just do the kind of sports that is physically ...er ..er.. enduring.. like swimming, running endlessly, and I can just be by myself . No need to cooperate with anyone and go whenever I feel like to.

Later, I found out that Flamingo is something you can dance on your own, and I like the rhythmic, exotic quality of it. I learned a bit of it in my late twenties when I can't find any course in HK . I got a 4-week trip to Spain and learn it full-time there, but just for 4 weeks. I sometimes do it at night at the Park when no body would look at me.

Strict AND Liberal Parents

My parents were not very harsh, actually quite liberal since my adolescence (at 13), when I got into a very famous secondary school. I did not know why. Probably I had already gained their trust that I would try my best academically. Also because the subjects got so difficult and out of their control all of the sudden, so I was left to deal with it myself.

• In my primary 6-12, I was like always the best student or won awards on painting, craft, and other academical subjects and with very good conduct. It was to a large extant the work of my mom, who would beat me up if I got 96/100..and I had bruise on my legs and arms.
• I didn't tell friends because people would think my mom being unreasonable or that I was showing off how smart I was..even consider 96/100 a low mark that worth punishment...

• Well... I did think my mom was reasonable because she had explained clearly to me how to do this and that and I also understood and I also believed that it was within my normal ability (not too harsh to get it) to just get everything correct.
  

Hardship at a school when I did not belong to

However, when I got into that famous secondary school, I was the worst on all academic subjects, except craft & arts and sports (bec I danced), and was being looked down upon by teachers and classmates because of my poor English and my lower middle class background.

• They were like among the richest and famous families in town. I only got a bare pass and often failed my test etc.

• Yet, my parents did not feel a bit ashamed, nor angered with me. They encouraged and tried to help although can't do much. They gave me a freehand on it. They had no problem that I had all these failes.. and the despising eye from the teachers. They just be calm and still felt proud of me. So I struggled on my own. I struggled to find a place among my peers at school.

• Gradually I came to be at peace with my lower status and be happy with it as I am from a different world from them. I continued with my low marks, very much behind others, but I was contented that I did make a lot of improvement because of peer pressure to excel. I did not excel like them, but I did improve a lot and my horizon widened a lot through their eyes too. And quite a lot of them enjoyed my company, because of my sincerity and also because I was (still am) of no compare with them and they felt very safe with me.

My relationships with my schoolmates (upper class)

• Quite a lot of them shared their deepest secrets with me (and I came to know quite a lot of secret stuff in these famous families), and came to see me as an important friend or even their very close friend. I became more and more comfortable with me. However, only until now when I looked back, I did not really thought of them as my close friends at all. It was like I was their friend, even very good friend, but none of them were my good friends. I roughly had 1-2 close friends out of being many of them's close friend.

I am a good friend or close friend to many of them at that school. I do see things like them, as trained by the school. The graduates can sometimes recognize each other when they are out at work, as there is something common ( I can't quite tell how) ...others said that it is the elegance...or ...er er.. I guess a lot of the famous gal schools (most of them have a long history and are led by Catholic fathers/sisters) in my town produce graduates of this kind of 'air'.

• These schools produce a lot of the high officials and famous entrepreneurs in HK, the so-called upper class in the city. When these graduates moved out to the society...we can find out each other. I don't know if I have that 'air', but I do recognize them sometimes when we have grown up and in the workplace.
• A lot of my schoolmates move into the lawyer thing and accountant business and they do recognise each other fairly soon and graduates of different years are linked up easily and help each other in their strive up the ladder. I know nobody from my school who works in my field ..so I am always the odd one out, as it always have been.

• I don't belong to them though, so I was just their friend, and not quite the vice versa. I think I had 1-2 who were my close friends at that time. One of them was from the lower class, and she was to me a very respectable person. She worked diligently (while I just fool around and be happy with my low grades) with the very limited resources she had. She even got up to 8th-grade in violin! We were always worrying or working for $$ to pay for our hobbys and her hobby - violin is much more expensive than my pointe shoes & lessons. I just thought that she was God.

My dear friends are devoted to the faith we share

If you ask me now..I only have my best friends, in terms of mind & emotional support & social life, from my uni (in my early 20s) and workplace, and my seminary. And they are my best friends, and also vice versa (I am really happy, reciprical friends) because we are soooo close in the above 3 areas as Christians.

• It is a very funny and different story about my church...I don't quite understand I won't consider them my personal friends but we are supportive to each other. But a few other Christians I knew from the above 3 places I really take them as my personal friends.
• As usual, I am many people's friend.....just not quite the reverse. I studied once full-time at a Christian seminary, it was a very important decision.
• And I was in HEAVEN... the happiest time of my life. I really had strong friendships there, although we are like from very different walks of life

My family gave me a freehand. I have little attachment with or quite independent from them

In a way, I would say my family has little role in all of these struggles I went through in my late teens, twenties, and early thirties. They made three strong objections during my adolescence (as above + my wish to study Psy at univ.), and we were quite tense at that time.

• But I'd usually be quiet, silently listened to what they said, considered a bit, and quietly went on with my decisions. I may explain a bit along, but if I get a very strong no, and they started to use their authority as parent to change me, I'd explain a bit, and they'd get very furious, and I would keep quiet.
• Then everytime they started the fight, I'd be quiet. For Ballet and Tin Toaism, I just very silently continue with them, try to mind my own business.

• For Psychology, I waited and delayed it. My father is a very traditional Chinese. Well, that means pragmatic and capitalistic. He escaped from Communist. He liked the British's rule. He liked everything, practical thing provided by the local govt, like education etc. But in blood, he is Chinese and like Chinese culture, just not the Chinese religions, like communism is a kind of religion too. Pragmatism and capitalism ARE the KEY features of Chinese parents in my city. Psy is bad because you can't earn much $$. So I took accountancy. Ha.
• My mom is a modern Cosmopolitan Chinese. She is more liberal. So I took up Psychology in UK after my father died.