Observing a team behavior regarding intercultural communication

Singapore, as we know, has a vibrant multi-cultural society. As such, to make it even more interesting, we’re now in NUS where we get a myriad of opportunities to mix around with individuals from different cultural groups.

Recently, NUS conducted its orientation for the international exchange students who will be studying their current semester in NUS. In order to familiarize the international students with the main cultural groups in Singapore, the Office of Student Affairs (OSA) had requested several societies to set up their booths at the event. Since I am part of NUS Hindu Society, I gladly took part in this event.

Since nuts are very popular among Indians, our booth gave away various kinds of nuts mixed together in paper cones and we did not provide any spoons to eat them with as we assumed that it was normal for everyone to eat snacks with bare hands. However, we realized later that not everyone thought the same. Surprisingly, many international students gave us puzzled looks and asked us how we eat them. Some even started licking the nuts as it was packed in a way that resembled an ice-cream cone!

It was then that we realized that different cultures have distinctly different characteristics and we cannot take anything for granted. We had seemingly adopted a high- context culture subconsciously and it did not coincide with everyone else’s there. In order to avoid such situations, we have to be more accommodating when interacting with other cultures as it is extremely important to expand our cultural awareness and enrich our intercultural relationships. This is in order to preserve mutual respect and minimize communication breakdown across different cultures.