Week 7- Living in your country or living abroad

Contrast essay
June, 2010

Living in Costa Rica and living in China

I love my country Costa Rica. I would never change it for nothing. I enjoy of its nice and beautiful beaches, its green environment, its people, its food; every single thing of it. Therefore living abroad for example in a country like China would be very terrible for me. China is a country totally different from Costa Rica. It has customs, food, currency, beliefs, clothing, and other things that for us they seem very strange. If I had had to go and live to a country like China, I would have had to face a lot of barrages. My adaption to this country would not be something easy. It will be difficult for me to adapt to the Chinese languages, food, and people.

It would be very difficult for me to adapt to the Chinese languages. In the last years people have been developing a type of interest and curiosity to learn Chinese languages such as Mandarin, Wu, and Cantonese. Language plays a key paper by the time anyone has to live in another country different from his or her native country. And I see Chinese languages as a very huge barrage for me. It would be fascinating for me to become skilled with these languages, but they seem so hard to learn because of the pronunciation, writing, speech, and other aspects. It is totally different from the letters and intonation that we are used to in our country. So this is why I consider that the adaption to the Chinese languages would be very hard for me.

Furthermore, food becomes an important aspect if one day I would have to go and live in China. China’s food is becoming extremely popular in other parts of the world. As whole country they have their own style and manner of preparing it. The cuisine in China and in Costa Rica it is too different concerning the preparation, ingredients, the way of eating it, and many other things. In China most of its dishes are spicy and prepared in bite-sized pieces, ready for picking it up and eating. Also the chopsticks are used at the table. My digestive system is certainly accustomed to the Costa Rican, Caribbean, or fast food, but not to the type of food that is prepared in China. Consequently my stomach would have a hard work. Thus it would be so difficult for me to adapt my body to this foreign food.

The adaption to Chinese people would be also difficult for me. Chinese people have been growing up with certain customs and culture. They have different manner of seeing the world. They have certain beliefs and behaviors for example the ways of seeing Chinese women. In this capitalized country women have no kind of power. It is very common in China for women to get abused. Women do not have any laws to protect them from domestic abuse. And in some urban areas of China is totally acceptable for men to commit abuses to their wives. I see this type of practice and belief too unfair. Therefore it would be so hard for me to accustom to Chinese people behaviors.

That’s why for all these reason, definitely it would be better for me to stay living in my wonderful country Costa Rica because there is nothing more beautiful than our country. Its people, belief, places, customs, clothing, and everything are wonderful. Finally I would just like to leave you with a Chinese proverb which is “If you fall seven times, get up eight.”