CULTURAL COMPETENCY IS NOT ENOUGH
THE CASE OF MONTREAL AIRPORT
Each of the person I met today –in the
context of the interactions of capitalist culture of travel- was culturally
competent. They had been born into families speaking Bembera or Farsi, had to
adjust themselves to French or English Language. Most importantly they had to
adjust ot the transient, individualistic, north American mentality of a present
without a past.
What we need is Efficiency-whether they
wear a burqah or turban or speaking accented English or French..
Remember, the Chinese are waiting.. to
gobble you up. Don't worry, the Indians and the Brazilians are not interested
in you.
You see cultural competency being
translated into commercial efficiency:
At Louis Vuitton stores in Paris, there are
Japanese speaking Attendants
At Gallerie Lafayette in Paris, there is a
separate section for Mandarin Speakers.
At the Security at Montreal Airport, I
asked the agent, what languages he speaks.. he answered.. French and English, a
little bit of Spanish.. and then he added,
I am learning Chinese.
You will need it, I added.
All western nations are courting the
Chinese tourists, regardless of the crude nature of the behaviour of some of
them, but Yuan makes the vultures forget the crassness…
When I arrived at the Montreal
International Airport, the shabbiness of the airport was a throwback to lesser
sophisticated times-it reminded me of the old Bogota Airport (as Mortiz Thomsen
would say where the drug lords were displaying their trophy wives)..
The inefficiency of the operations were
immediately evident. The Border Control agent a long time to let me go to the
Transit areas, only after a telephone call. But no one was at the door of the
transit lounge, had to wait more than 15 minutes, standing there by myself,
bringing the matter to the attention of the Security personnel. As it is
common, in the western world, the service personnel (ticketing agents, boarding
service personnel, café waiters, cleaners at the Maple Leaf Lounge etc) were
all foreigners, most of them just proficient in one of the two official
languages. Where are the native Canadians, now that most manufacturing has
flown off to China? Swiss Air which I was flying today, the agents at the
counter were anything but Swiss in their efficiency.
I could name it the Montreal Malaise. To
get a boarding pass reissued needed the assistance of one Asian, one African
and one Irani…
Do you remember the old jokes about JAP..
jewish American princesses? How many
Japs does it take to change a Light Bulb?
While the Westerners are worried about
Cultural Competence
Cultural Sensitivity
Diversity
And teaching to respect these values, which
cannot be taught anyway. ( look at the rise of the fascist, anti immigration
political scene in Netherlands, Sweden, Hungary and Greece)
Do you think it is relevant to put up
highway signs in Arizona to say
We Love Mexicans
Or advertise what the French say:
On a billboard in Toulouse..
There are no Arabs of Moslems in France,
only French.
The Asians are running further and further
away and ahead. In the capitalist system, social coherence, empathy is not what
is stressed, but money, profit. (whereas as an average WALMART employee does
not get liveable wages or medical benefits, the CEO is proud of his 22 million
dollar Salary!)
Don't continue to blame the Chinese for
human rights abuses (but don't forget it either)
NIKE, ZARAH and multitude of others who
made use of Cheap Labour and unhealthy practices as in Bangladesh (remember the
recent collapse of a clothing factory where more than 1000 people died!)
Is it also not a form of abuse of human
rights?
It looks like there is only one currency
Money, Profit, Stockholders, Stocks,
Shares..
Amidst all these, falling European living
standards, rising Asian living standards, lack of human rights and ethics on a
global scale.. sit the immigrants, 200 million of them
Eritreans in Australia
Turks in Germany
Sri Lankans in Norway
Sudanese in North Dakota
Afghanis in Britain
Bangladeshis in Malaysia
Indonesians in Singapore
Burmese in Dubai
Filipinos anywhere they can go
Moroccans, Algerians, Nigerians, West
Africans, East Africans, South Africans..
Lucky are the people who do not have to
emigrate because the pleasure of living in ones own country, in a state of contentment,
is a cornerstone of a house of happiness.
When I was an adolescent, some one gave me a key chain with the following words
"Never
mind, it is good to die for our country" (En davar, tov lamut be'ad
artzenu
ארצנו בעד למות טוב,דבר אין I am unable to write the Hebrew characters in the correct order! here the characters are from left to right, which is not the case with Hebrew..
I
am grateful that I have lived in 10 different countries without being a
Immigrant, in my eyes and in the eyes of the locals, in any one of them!
