In the United States, I am used to waiting patiently in a waiting room until I am individually called to meet with a doctor. Then I wait alone in a small room for a nurse, and finally for the doctor to meet with me. Not just any doctor, but my doctor who I have known for years. In this hospital, things were very different. Fortunately, we were able to bypass the waiting room thanks to our connections with a friendly pre-med student working at the hospital. He was extremely helpful in guiding us around and explaining my injury to the doctors. The first room we entered was a small room containing with one desk, one stool, one doctor, and about ten patients. I stood in line along with the other patients as the doctor assessed each person. There was a very different sense of privacy here, and it seemed to be a completely normal interaction for patients to listen and make comments about the doctor’s diagnosis of other patients. Sure enough, when it was my turn to be assessed the other patients crowded around me waiting to hear the doctor’s diagnosis for the foreigner with the mysterious finger injury. I couldn’t understand what the doctor or patients were saying until my lab mate translated for me. However, the patients’ gasps and worried tones in response to the doctor’s comments made it clear to me that the diagnosis was not a pleasant one. After visiting with the doctor, we were led to another room where we spoke with a more specialized doctor. We went through the same process in order to get a second opinion on my injury. After that we were led to a third doctor, and then to a fourth doctor! The fourth doctor was the most specialized in his field and made the final decision on how to proceed with the injury. I preferred his office because of the privacy. Finally, I was the only patient being treated in his office!

The most frustrating part of my experience was having to rely on someone else to translate for the doctor. My lab mate is trustworthy and was extremely helpful in explaining to me what the doctor was saying, but it was frustrating not hearing the details for myself about an issue that I was concerned about. We only ran into one translation problem, where my lab mate mistakenly informed me that the doctor would have to “remove my finger.” It took several seconds of staring at my panicked face for her to realize that she had accidentally used the wrong English words. Oops! I have no hard feelings about it and now we joke about the misunderstanding.

After a quick procedure, I was asked to return to the hospital throughout the week so the doctor could monitor my improvement. Here I encountered the same cultural difference in regards to privacy. During these checkups, curious patients did not hesitate to enter the room, hover over my shoulder, and watch intently as the doctors handled my rather unpleasant and disgusting wound. It was difficult at times to hide my look of disbelief because their presence felt to me like an invasion of my privacy. In one case, a man stood so close to me that he popped my invisible personal bubble! He was so close that I could actually hear him breathing as he watched the doctor handle my injury. Several times I had to stop and take a second to remember that the patients did not realize how uncomfortable they made me. In the United States, it would be considered rude and intrusive for patients to watch and listen during your individual doctor visit, but their culture does not find those actions unacceptable. From the patients’ perspectives, they had done nothing wrong. It was an interesting and difficult difference to adjust to, and I realized that I could not be offended by these interactions because it was no one’s intention to upset me.

Unfortunately, my injury has set me back a few days in my research and has prevented me from doing some of the hands-on work in my lab. Thankfully, there are still some procedures that I am more than capable of performing while I recover. We are approaching the end of our research, but there is still a lot of information and data that my lab mate and I need to obtain. We are working very hard this week to retrieve as much data as possible before we leave Xiamen. If it were possible to extend the amount of time we have to gather data I would be thrilled because I think our data will be very helpful for future research on this shark species. It will be exciting to finally analyze our results!

We spent three full days at the expo visiting pavilions for different countries and interacting with other tourists. While the World expo attracts tourists from across the globe, Cathy and I still found ourselves to be two of the very few international tourists. With the combination of my height and Cathy’s dark skin, we clearly stood out in the vast crowds. The great thing about this was that we had the opportunity to talk with hundreds of people who were curious about where we came from and why we look the way we do (and when I say hundreds of people, I am not exaggerating!). Whether we were standing in lines, exploring the pavilions, eating meals, or watching performances, curious people were never hesitant to ask questions or take pictures of us. Back in the United States it would be odd for a stranger to ask to take a picture with us, so this unusual type of attention really made me think about the differences between American and Chinese culture.

In the United States, midwest, southern, east coast and west coast states have certain cultural aspects that make them different from one another, yet most Americans speak the same language and have major cultural aspects that bring people together. American students from Eckerd College come from all over the U.S., but can easily communicate and generally eat the same foods and interact with others in similar ways. Chinese provinces have very different cultures that make them distinguishable, much more so than regions of the United States. Throughout China there are many different dialects that might as well be considered separate languages. People who speak different dialects cannot understand one another, which makes communication very difficult. Food preferences are also very different throughout China, so people from the different provinces may have completely different dishes and diets. Provinces might also have their own ways of interacting with others, for example, beginning conversations with strangers or playing with strangers’ children might be encouraged in some provinces and thought to be rude in others. After learning about so many cultural differences throughout China, I thought about how unique our American culture is. People in the United States are often brought together by current cultural similarities like foods, language, music, and by their ideas for a better future. Since Chinese people currently participate in such different cultures, everyone is brought together by their common past. America’s history is relatively young and since our American culture formed from pieces of very different cultural backgrounds, it seems that we are brought together by our current culture and our plans for America’s future. I had an interesting conversation with the group in Shanghai about this difference, and one of my lab mates said that young people in China have an obligation to carry China’s past with them as they grow older. As Americans, I think we consider ourselves more as a part of the future than as a part of the past.

In my lab, we have been researching the embryonic development of the shark Scoliodon laticaudus, which is commonly fished as a food source in the Fujian province. We buy pregnant female sharks from a street market vendor in Xiamen and dissect them in the lab in order to remove the embryos from the mother’s uterus. The embryos range in size, anywhere from 1 - 30 cm. The main purpose of the research is to determine where the gonads begin to develop in embryos and to observe how this growth progresses throughout the stages of embryonic development.

One of the most memorable cultural experiences for me was taking the opportunity to go berry picking with my lab mates. The English translation of these berries was “wax berries,” a dark red or purple fruit that does not grow in the United States. I had tasted these berries once before and I absolutely loved them, so I was excited to venture out to pick them by hand. Before leaving for the day long trip, I had pictured myself picking berries at an American style orchard, but when we arrived I was surprised to find out that the wax berries, which I had been practically drooling over the entire car ride, were located at the very top of a mountain! After about an hour of maneuvering through trees and ducking under low branches, we reached the top of the mountain. After picking our basket of berries, the entire group took a long rest at the top of the mountain, eating our wax berries as we looked out over the ocean.

After slipping in and sliding all the way back down the mountain, we stumbled across a local seafood restaurant for dinner. The building was set up on some sort of floating device so it stood alone out on the water. There was a man there who paddled customers from the land to the restaurant on a small wooden ferry, as simple as a large plank of wood. As a group we ordered every kind of seafood imaginable. The meal was delicious! Everything about that day was completely unexpected, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way.