With more and more Chinese tourists traveling abroad, other
countries are becoming increasingly uncomfortable when confronting
Chinese tourists' bad behavior. China National Tourism
Administration and the central government's Office of the Spiritual
Civilization Development Steering Commission have released a list
of "dos and don'ts" for citizens intending to travel abroad in
early October.
The move aims to promote civilized behavior among Chinese
travelers and restore the country's image, which has been tarnished
by the behavior of some Chinese tourists, according to Xinhua News
Agency.
On September 22, the two government departments exposed 10 sorts
of bad behaviors, Southern Weekend reported on September
28.
"Littering", "spitting", "snatching bus seats", "queue-jumping",
"taking off shoes and socks in public", "speaking loudly", "bad
temper and cursing", "smoking in non-smoking areas" and many others
are listed in "The Frequent Bad Behaviors of Chinese Citizens Who
Travel Abroad", enumerating complaints by netizens.
This summary came as a damning warning ahead of this year's
golden travel week -- China's National Day holiday, and could cause
a poor reflection on Chinese society. According to several rumors,
the nation's relevant departments "are prepared to update the
passport law, punishing those who badly behave in other countries
and damage Chinese tourists' image, and restrict them from leaving
the country again."
"In recent years, some Chinese citizens' bad habits have
severely damaged China's image as a 'nation of etiquette', causing
huge concern and criticism from both home and abroad." said Li
Xiaoman, an official from the spiritual civilization office.
According to the newspaper, a report about tourists' bad
behaviors at Hong Kong Disneyland opening day in last September,
astounded top officials. Li Changcun, a member of Chinese Communist
Party's Political Bureau Standing Committee, asked relevant
departments to help improve citizens' manners. Li Xiaoman indicated
that China will initiate a project to improve the situation in
three years and that this exposure was just the beginning.
?
Zhang Lishen, a civil servant from the State Intellectual Property
Office who once went abroad, told that besides the common bad
habits like "spitting", what startled him was "group activity" and
"loud speaking".
"Chinese people like to act in a group. Tens of people move
together, talking and laughing, and taking up a whole bench when
they rest." he said.
"Foreign restaurants are very quiet even when they are full of
guests. People keep their voice low enough to just let the talking
partners hear. But many Chinese people speak very loudly, totally
ignoring others' feelings and privacy." Zhang added.
Bai Yang, a Taiwan scholar, has written a typical example in his
book The Ugly Chinese, "Two? Guangdong people talked
on a street in America. Local people thought they were going to
fight and called the police. But when the police came and asked
what they were doing, they said, 'We are just whispering." This
mirrors the view of Shanghai scholar Zhu Dake who thinks the noisy
behavior indicates that Chinese people lack the sense of public
manners.
Wang Yuan, once a student in Britain, said Chinese people always
like to take photos everywhere, even where photos are strictly
prohibited. He said this could lead British people to comment that
Chinese are simple or behave bizarrely, a far from desirable
outcome.
"We are going to improve the inner being of every Chinese
citizen. Travel issue is a breaking point. Those who travel abroad
usually have money and high social status, we'd like to start with
them." said another official from central spiritual civilization
office.??
According to him, the office was discussing details of tourism
guides and behavior regulation with eight central departments
including the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Commerce, Public
Security, Construction, Railways, Communications and the National
Tourism Administation.
But the official denied the rumors that measures will restrict
offenders from going abroad. "We haven't heard such kind of the
proposals."
The guidelines were issued on October 2.
Guo Xiaocong, a professor at the University of International
Relations, suggested that governments should classify and ban the
worst offenders from travel, thus enabling travel agencies to
control and supervise tourists'?behavior by promoting
responsible actions at the start of tours.
Among the guidelines for Chinese travelers are to not litter,
not talk loudly, respect queue order, be polite in public places
and observe the "ladies first" rule with spitting sitting top of
the bad habits.
The number of Chinese traveling overseas has rocketed in recent
years as many in the nation of 1.3 billion people become wealthier.
Chinese tourists made 31 million trips abroad last year, with that
number expected to rise to 100 million by 2020.
(China.org.cn by Zhang Rui October 8, 2006)