My blogger friend Tikno from Indonesia has suggested this week’s LBC topic.
Let me first define ‘culture’ as I think Tikno means for this post – “The ideas, customs, and social behaviour of a particular people or society.”
Having travelled both in the East and the West and having read quite a bit about both, I can vouch for one thing. And that is that people everywhere are the same and the cultures also the same except that in details descriptions have to be changed.
Almost all the differences have been because of usage of wrong terminology. Western for Modern and Eastern for Ancient.
Once this terminology is corrected nothing is hidden. In both the Western and Eastern cultures, modern communication aids have broken down mysteries and have spread knowledge while assisting in improving living standards everywhere. Technology has also brought people together like never before.
Eastern ancient culture based on an agrarian economy supported by handicrafts has been moving towards, Western industrial culture for quite some time and in fact, today, there is hardly any Eastern nation where this change has not had its impact. Some like Japan and South Korea can be compared to any Western nation while other nations like India and Indonesia are well on the way to becoming so.
On the other hand, movement from the West towards the East for spiritual knowledge, yoga, martial arts etc besides its ancient medical wisdom has also seen increase in the recent years.
This process has its advantages and disadvantages and again the use of modern communication methods can be used to minimise the effects that the latter have on people everywhere. Perceptions of each other in terms of lifestyles and values will change through information.
The potential is also not hidden as suggested by Tikno. It is ignored by most but is available for anyone interested to exploit the synergy that is available for the asking.
We are not human beings but human becomings. There is hope yet.
You can see what the other writers of the LBC have to say in their respective blogs. Maria, Pravin, Ashok and Shackman.
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