Hokie and Heelots

I was a Hokie. 

Hokies are very interested in number and statistics. They're also very gender specific, females only talk to females, and if they want to talk to the other sex they need to ask the "head hokie." They communicate by asking questions and to start a conversation they tap the person on the shoulder, say the number of the letters in their name, then tap again to end the conversation. Today, the Hokie's mission is to find out the Heelots birth month and the number of siblings they had. 

In order to do this, we needed to go into the land of Heelotia. The Heelots were very different. They didn't like any physical touching, only talked when the right cheek was next to the other right cheek of each person, and whispered. They only answered questions with a "heelot" which meant "yes" or "heelotia" which meant "no." They also thought numerical information and statistics were invasive and personal information. 

Obviously, these two cultures conflict. And to answer the very obvious question: NO, I was not tripping on acid. YES, this is a culture simulation my group did today. (Based off the BaFa' BaFa simulation.) You can guess what happened... communication failed, people questioned if they should changed their norms in order to integrate into the others, there was frustration, some felt alienated and others felt like there was a lack of understanding. 

This Saturday, I will leave to Brazil with the Hokies and Heelots in mind. This example illustrates what can happen when you go into a new country, culture, and community. At what limit do you lose apart of your "self" or your identity in order to adapt to another culture? How does your attitude and behaviors impacting those around you? What are the values and beliefs you want to keep? 

Let me end with the Sunglasses Story that I was told today.

"Imagine that in your own country, from the time of the first people, today, and far into the future, everyone that was ever born or will be born with 2 legs, 2 arms, 2 eyes, a nose and a mouth and a pair of sunglasses. The color of the lenses in the sunglasses is yellow. No one has ever thought it strange that the sunglasses are these, because they have always been there and they are a part of the human body. Everyone has them. What makes them yellow are the values, attitudes, ideas, beliefs, and assumptions that all people in your country have in common. Everything they have seen, learned or experienced (past, present and future) has entered into the brain through yellow lenses. Everything has been filtered and interpreted through these values and attitudes that have made the lenses yellow. The yellow lenses thus represent your attitudes, beliefs, values and cultural background.

 Thousands of miles away in another country, from the time of the first people, today and far in to the future everyone that was ever born or will ever be born with 2 legs, 2 arms, 2 eyes, a nose, a mouth and a pair of sunglasses. The color of the menses in the sunglasses is blue. No on has ever though it strange that the sunglasses are these, because they have always been there and they are a part of the human body. Everyone has them. Everything the people see, learn or experience is filtered through the blue lenses.

 A traveler from the yellow sunglasses country who wanted to go to that far away land has enough sense to realize that to learn about the country and the people more thoroughly, he would have to acquire some blue sunglasses so that he could “see”. When the traveler arrived, he wore the blue glasses, stayed for 2 years, and felt that he really was learning about the attitudes, beliefs, and values of the people. He actually “saw” wearing the sunglasses. He came home to this own country and declared that he was now an expert on the country and that their culture was green."