What, according to the passage, excites the tourists?
Directions: Answer the given question based on the following passage:
Cultural contrasts are exciting for tourists. They pay to experience them. But for those who have to live and work in a foreign culture, the contrasts can be difficult, confusing and painful. Differences are hard to live with.
Not everybody believes that cultural differences matter. ‘We are all human beings,’ an Iowan businessman declared at a meeting on cross-cultural business interacts, ‘Japanese, Americans, or Germans, underneath we are all just the same. We cry the same tears, we smile the same smiles, and we bleed the same blood.’ He, like so many others, believes that in the face of love and profit people are all the same.
Sameness was also on the mind of the American student when she walked into an Amsterdam shop to ask the way to the Anne Frank house. Still shocked she later told how the woman in the shop had refused to answer. She had suggested she buy a map! According to the student such a rude response was unheard of in the US.
This student had failed to recognize that not all people are the same. Some people consider an American who demands directions in a loud voice rude. Likewise, Japanese and German business people may not appreciate ‘Just call me John’’ ‘a deal is a deal’, ‘get to the point’, ‘I am what I am’, or any other expression that the Iowan businessman customarily uses. Not recognizing such differences can cost dearly, in emotional energy and possibly lost deals.
There is need to focus on the differences that exist between the people of Europe and the US. It offers the transnationals two metaphors as an aid for coping with those differences, namely the citadel for European society with its firm roots in tradition, and the caravan for the less established and more fluid society of the United States. It can well be predicted that people who see the transatlantic contrasts through these metaphors will avoid much confusion, pain, and, who knows, some cost. Here is a sample.
A few years ago an American sales team made a presentation to the manufacturing team of an Italian tractor company. The Americans had prepared themselves thoroughly. They came right to the point, provided illustrations with slides, had anticipated all conceivable questions about their products, and could counter all objections. Afterwards the Americans congratulated each other on a job well done. They did not, however, get the sales contract.
An executive who is familiar with cross-cultural business dealings attended the meeting. He noted: ‘The Americans came to the point too quickly. They alienated the Italians with the style of their presentation. The Italians operate in a business environment where personal relations are crucial; they want to get to know the people they deal with. The Americans would have done better to take the Italians out for a long business conversation over lunch with good food and wine.’
Misunderstandings like this one are all too common. One would expect that, with the increasing internationalization of politics and business, sensitivity to cultural differences would grow, and that at the same time such differences would become less pronounced. Yet neither expectation is fulfilled. Cultural differences are real and pervasive; and we have learned that frequent contact does not guarantee mutual understanding. (Excerpted from The Caravan and The Citadel by Arjo Klamer)