Gillian's Post

Intercultural Experience Blog Post: Exploring Sub-cultures
Gillian Tomasini
Event: Open Shop Night-The Hub Bicycle Co-op
 

On Thursday February 7th, I attended an “open shop” night at The Hub Bicycle Co-op on Oak street. These open-shop nights are held from 7-9pm on various days throughout the month at different bike shops around Minneapolis. The open shop nights are designed to be a safe and comfortable space for women and transgender people to ask any questions they have about bike maintenance and mechanics and not feel intimidated or silly in a heavily male-dominated business. Instead, the main goal of these nights is to educate women and transgender people  about bicycle mechanics  in order to boost their sense of empowerment and self efficacy.

I decided to use this experience as my intercultural experience because I am interested in exploring the arena of sub-cultures and navigating how sub-cultures can serve to support and foster various factions of society. Sub-cultures are not necessarily linked to any particular racial or ethnic background and can therefore attract members from a much larger pool of people. The cycling sub-culture in the Twin Cities is not linked to any one specific religious or ethnic background although it is heavily dominated by Caucasian males in their 20s and 30s.

In my case, attending my first open shop night at the Hub gave me insight into a culture that is technically open to all people but that is stunted in its growth by limitations like a lack of affordable gear, gender segregation, and a lack of widely available bicycle education.  These barriers mean that people of lower socioeconomic status, women, transgender people, the elderly, and people of color are often not included in the bicycle community of Minneapolis. In addition, there is a fair amount of “snobbery” for lack of a better term that unfortunately helps define bike culture in Minneapolis. This “holier than thou” attitude makes cycling inaccessible to many people by making the sport/pastime just plain intimidating.

In my personal life, I ride my bike as a means of daily transportation, exercise and fun, but  have recently become more interested in learning about bike mechanics and racing bikes and have made the decision to start attending open shop nights in order to build connections and community along with building my technical skill set.  I have always known that a sub-culture regarding biking exists in the Twin Cities but I am just starting to become involved and carve out a place for myself within this culture. To me, attending the open shop night seemed like the best way to start:

I arrived at the Hub a little after 7pm on a freezing cold February night.  It had taken a little bit of effort to pull myself out of my house and get on my bike to make it to the shop because of the weather and because I felt intimidated by my lack of knowledge about bike mechanics and was anxious at the foreignness of what I was about to do. Overlying all of these feelings however was a desire to start learning, start talking with people, start amassing knowledge and skills. So I pushed open the door and wheeled my bike inside the shop. Two female mechanics stood behind the counter and were helping two other women work on their bicycles. Everyone turned to greet me as I walked in and found a stand for my bike. Immediately, I felt more at ease but not quite comfortable.

One of the mechanics came over to me and we began discussing what I wanted to work on that night. We decided I would work on cleaning the bike first since it had accumulated so much grime from being ridden in the winter. Then we would adjust the brakes and check the rest of the bike for wear and tear. I was introduced to many different kinds of bike tools and got to play with bike grease for a while. One of the things I like best about working with bikes is being able to get my hands dirty and not having to worry about it.

While I worked to clean my bike, we chatted about weather conditions and compared notes on winter biking.  The mood in the shop was relaxed and the female mechanics made it easy to ask questions and didn’t fault us or scoff at us for not knowing the simplest maneuvers.  The women clearly enjoyed working on bikes and helping others learn about mechanics and I was glad to have found a way to learn about bike mechanics that wasn’t overwhelming or intimidating. Instead, I saw emphasis placed on female/transgender empowerment, acceptance of all abilities and orientations, trial and error, as well as hands on learning. When I asked for help, the women favored guiding me rather than flat-out showing me what to do. They let me use the tools, take my time and make mistakes. I appreciated the fact that the women were so patient and while I may have felt like an outsider going into the experience, I gradually became more and more at ease as time went on and was able to learn a few new things.

After a couple hours, the shop night ended and I left after thanking the women who had helped me and promising to come back the next time. Going to this open shop night was incredibly important for me and I came away from the whole experience with a good feeling. Gender inequality is a huge problem plaguing the cycling community in Minneapolis (and elsewhere as far as I can tell) and a very frustrating point of contention for me. Typically,women are hired to work sales in the front of the store and men are hired to work mechanics in the back of the store. Whenever I need to take my bike into a shop to get it looked at or to ask someone about parts, accessories etc...I  make sure that I have my questions ready beforehand in order to not appear silly in front of what will surely be a male dominated staff. Too many times have I gone into shops and felt like my questions were stupid or not worth the mechanics time. Or I’ll go into a shop and be mostly ignored until I go up to someone and ask for help. Either situation is alienating for someone who is trying to learn about bikes and become involved in bettering the community.

Although I feel that many of the preconceived notions I have about bike culture in the Twin Cities still stand (snobbishness, inaccessibility, gender inequality etc..), attending this shop night helped me I realized that the culture is opening up and making huge efforts to become accessible to larger populations of people no matter their race, sexuality, gender and socioeconomic background. If I had never gone to the shop night and made a little bit of an effort to ask questions, I might still be thinking that the bike community is rigid in its exclusion of others. Biking is being pushed as a sustainable and “green” method of transportation and the market for cycling infrastructure in cities across the country is booming. There will always be those people who want to keep biking separate from the masses but realistically, I believe this will become a smaller and smaller group over time.

I feel that even though I still have a lot to learn about bike mechanics and culture, I am making small, measurable steps towards reaching a goal that will continue to evolve over time. The atmosphere in the shop helped me realize that there is a place for me in this community as long as I feel passionately about being involved and learning. I have since gone to several other shop nights around the Cities and even got a job in a shop myself! I encourage people I meet (especially women and transgender folk) to attend these shop nights and bolster their own confidence with biking. I know it’s helped me and will continue to do so in the future.

Small World Coffee Hour – Malaysian event

Small World Coffee Hour – Malaysian event

Like every other Friday, I go to Yudoff hall for work, set up everything and wait for people to come to our Small World Coffee Hour event. Small World Coffee Hour (SWCH) is a student-ran organization belonging to the ISSS (International Student Scholar Services), which is administered by the University of Minnesota. So all the funding come from our tuition and fundraising activities. Last year, SWCH needed one more person on the board, and my friend recommended me. I then had an interview, which turned out to be a whole intercultural experience. Alex Cleberg, the advisor, asked me a lot of questions about the way I interact with the diversity, and if I had different ideas about future possible event. He also asked me if I knew what the social butterfly was, which is engaging a small, short talk to several people and find interest among these people, so that they can meet one another. After the interview, I got the job, and that’s why I now film and capture captivating moments during our events. The video I made on Friday, March thirst was really challenging. It is really challenging for international to speak in front of a camera in English. I’m only showing the takes that turned out well, but I’ve asked many more people, and had to take multiple takes with some people. I recall these lecture we had about the importance of body language. Many students who join SMCH events just arrived this semester, and have a very limited English. Therefore, they can’t really talk to anybody outside of their own culture. That’s where I use the “social butterfly”, and try to break the ice. I found two students who just arrived here last January and it turned out that they were both good tennis players. It took me some time to make them communicate, but they eventually got to know each other and found some enjoyment in their small conversation, by doing lots of forehands and backhands miming.

            Another thing we do at every coffee hour event is to host a different student group to serve food for the attendees, prepare a presentation, and play cultural games. That Friday, we hosted the Malaysian Student Association. I got the chance to work with the board, and also to meet new freshman international student from Malaysia. It turned out that they really didn’t like some of the food that was supposed to be authentic. They told one of my coworker that it does not taste anything like food at home in Malaysia, and for some reason, that little accident did not help make them get closer to the Malaysian board member. It was clearly a sign of culture shock. Another thing that I witnessed is the clear barrier between Asian American and Asian students. Not only because of the language barrier, these Malaysian international students along with other Asian international students can’t identify with Asian Americans really easily.

            Another big theme that occasionally becomes a little problem is the amount of jokes about stereotypes. I’m going to combine this with different activities student groups host decide to do. For instance, we can clearly see that when we have an African student group coming, or even a South East Asian group, they usually perform a traditional dance, and then invite people to join it. So few people actually join the dance, and I often hear comments like “why do these people always dance like that?”, or “I feel like they always play the same music!”. Stereotypes are so powerful that they don’t leave anybody impartial. I think it’s just so easy to think about our own and other people stereotypes, but we don’t think always think about them when we encounter a situation we don’t want to be or where we’re not really comfortable in.

            This leads to intercultural acculturation. Concerning international students, I would assume that their goals and motivation to come to the United States are pretty much the same. They want to get a good education, and for many, find a job here. However, the acculturation process is really different for all of us. Most international students on this campus are Asian, and mainly Chinese and Korean. When I compare their adaptation to the American culture to Middle Eastern students, African or European, it is really different. The process is much slower, and I think this is due to the fact that they are numerous, and it gets difficult for them to “get out” of their comfort zone. We can easily notice that on throughout campus, but also at SMCH. It happens, but it’s fairly rare to see a Chinese or Korean international student hang out with someone from another culture. I believe that cultures also play a main role in the transition process too. For example, Korea is a very conservative country, and people pay a very close attention to their appearances. Confrontations are not good, and people should not lose face. They have a strong degree of tolerance toward the new culture they go into, and there’s a gap between the local culture and how their culture is being represented in that country.

            To conclude my reflection, SMCH does a good job in gathering different cultures in the same room. However, cultural differences are sometimes really hard to overcome, even in such a situation, and each individual are not always responsible for the difficulty of their own adaptation.

A Step Into Hmong Culture

On February 28^th, 2013, my roommate and I visited the Hmong International Market in St. Paul.  While on the way to the market, we really didn’t have any expectations. Neither of us was very familiar with the Hmong culture, and we planned on going to the market with very open minds.  Little did we know, we were about to immerse ourselves into a completely different culture just a short 15-minute drive from home.  When we first pulled into the parking lot, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.  The cars in the parking lot were average, the buildings/warehouses were a little bit rundown but nothing too surprising, and the people outside looked no other than a different ethnicity you would see walking on campus.  

The second that we stepped foot into the entrance of the east building, I felt a sudden transformation from being the American majority to the minority in Hmong culture.  All American culture, values, norms, symbols, basically my reality, had suddenly disappeared.  I was standing on the outside looking in for really the first time in my life, and it was truly an eye-opening experience.  The sounds, smell, and the commotion and clutter were the first things that registered with me.  I felt like I was walking through a small village in Asia, and which I later found out, I pretty much was.  This market was very chaotic, it seemed like they try and cram as much as possible into the little space they had.  I noticed that each stand was separately owned and generally had 1-2 people working.  My best conclusion for this was that a different family owned each individual stand.  I noticed that some stands were nicer than others, which probably meant that those families had more money than the others.  For the most part, each stand sold different products.  Some sold clothes, while others sold decorations or kitchenware.  Just about anything that you can imagine was for sale at the market.  The stands were very small, about 12 feet by 12 feet.  They were set up on both the left and right sides with a walkway running through the middle of them.  Each stand had their own unique display in the front of the shop and had a walkway around it that could only fit one or two people inside of the shop.  They seemed very unorganized, they didn’t have aisle numbers or product labels like you would find at your typical American grocery store.  

The food at the market was also very interesting.  It was definitely not what you would find in an American grocery store, well besides the vegetables.  Going into the market, I had known that this culture likes to eat all sorts of strange things. It was very interesting to see what they had to offer in the meat section. Pork brains, ears and stomach were among the few that caught my attention.  Oh and I almost forgot the un-skinned fish, how appetizing!

Enough documentation, lets talk about the people and dig a little deeper into the culture!  I think the most interesting thing I noticed when I first got there was how little attention we received.  I noticed how they weren’t the ones to strike up a conversation.  The main reason for this was because the majority of them didn’t speak English too well.  While I could hold a conversation with the majority of the people I spoke with, I noticed that they didn’t feel very comfortable with me, and to be honest, I didn’t feel that comfortable either. 

The first woman I talked to seemed to have a pretty good grasp on the English language.  I wanted to know where they were from and a little bit about their history.  She told me that mostly everyone there was Laotian American.  That means that they are originally from Laos and are included in the larger category of Asian Americans.  She continued to tell me that she arrived here in 1982 after being a refugee who escaped from the Vietnam War in Laos in the early 1970’s.   When I asked her what she thinks of America, she replied, “good.”  All conversations I had were very short and to the point.  I would often try and elaborate or ask further questions and they would have a difficult time understanding.  One thing I noticed that they knew very well was dollar amounts.  I often asked about something I was unfamiliar with, and all they would reply is how much it costs.  I thought they would definitely know English a little better than they did, but it seems as if they don’t interact with Americans too often.

My roommate and I were the only Americans in the market, and we definitely felt apart of the out-group.  Nobody was speaking in English, and nobody was speaking with us.  It was a very strange feeling to experience in America where our culture is clearly dominant.  I noticed how much they valued family, and how close everyone was inside the market.  I spoke with a man and he said that they consist of 18 total families, and everyone knows each other.  They are basically living their own unique lifestyle in America with out really even having to interact with those outside of their culture.  This was shocking to me.  It seems as though they all support each other, they buy each other’s products, and that’s how they get by financially.  This also relates to how they have adapted to American culture.  While I would say that they understand the basics of American culture, I don’t think that they have fully adapted to American culture. The reason for this is because they don’t really need to.  They have just about everything they need right there, and they operating as their own little cultural village within the larger American culture.  

For really never being out of the country and having the opportunity to immerse myself in another culture, this is definitely the closest I have been to experiencing culture shock.  Stepping into this market is the closest thing to being in the country of Laos without actually being in Laos.  While I don’t think that I experienced the full effect of culture shock, I would definitely say that I experienced some of these characteristics.  The first thing I noticed was identity loss. Right when I stepped inside, I felt a part of the minority.  Like I said earlier, my roommate and I were the only white people there.  This definitely created instant confusion with norms.  I was confused on how I should communicate with these people. I felt like I was talking to them extra loud and slow, and it seemed like they recognized that.  I often got double takes from people, probably wondering, “hmm, why is he in here.”  I felt a sense of rejection from their culture. They didn’t seem to be very welcoming, or perhaps it was me who wasn’t very welcoming?  While I knew that I could step right out the door and everything would be back to reality, I don’t think I experienced as intense culture shock where I would if I were in another country.  While learning about culture shock in class, I was always thinking to myself, “that probably wouldn’t happen to me.” But after visiting this Hmong market, I realized what exactly these characteristics of culture shock are like. I am very glad I had the opportunity to experience it. 

Reflecting on my trip to the Hmong International Market, I would say that I am very glad to have had the opportunity to experience this.  I was very glad to be forced out of my comfort zone and was able to see how the Laos culture functions.  It was interesting listening to their language, seeing their clothes, trying their food, and most importantly communicating and interacting with this completely different culture.  It was interesting to see how close everyone in the community was, and how they place higher value on family.  It was surprising to be the minority for once, and feeling uncomfortable and confused with this cultures norms, values, and language.  I think if I were to go back in the future, I would have a much better understanding and appreciation of the Laos culture.