In UAE (United Arab Emirates) there's a total of 80% of the population that is foreign, from Africa there's Egyptians, Kenyans, Sudanese, Somalians, Nigerians, Libyans, Algerians, South Africans, Tunisians and Mauritanians.
From Asia there's an Indian and Pakistani domination, then Chinese, Vietnamese, Philippians, Syrians, Lebanese, Palestinians, Jordanians and Iraqis.
From Europe there's a lot of Scotsmen and Brits, then Romanian and Dutch here and there.
Then there's a whole bunch of Americans and Canadians.
The weird thing I noticed is that people from countries closer to each other in distance tend to not make friends, for example Canadians and Americans, Indians, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis, Chinese and Vietnamese, Syrians and Lebanese, and Brits and Scotsmen (even though a Scotsman told me that's pretty normal).
I dunno if this is relevant but I just wanted to share a little about the place where I work, I have all these nationalities here where I work, we get along nicely but the language and cultural barriers create a thick wall of bullet proof glass that limits "getting along" to work and necessary interactions only for the most part.
In Texas where I moved and live for almost four years now; it has annoyed me a great deal at first that there's a lot of Mexicans that don't speak English and don't make an effort to learn, before I learned more about internal political correctness in the U.S I once asked a Mexican guy at a party about why that happens and he told me "To preserve our heritage" and I asked him "Wouldn't the best way to preserve your heritage be that you stay in Mexico?! you know where it's normal to speak Spanish!!", my wife poked me to shut up, I think you're defying the courtesy of the country that took you in and let you settle here, obviously it's treating you much better than your country of origin or you wouldn't have came, I'm Egyptian and my mother tongue is Arabic, I won't forget my identity, but I feel I have been and still am making effort to adapt and mingle in the American culture where I live and have friends, I don't and shouldn't expect the opposite, I just find it rude really.
I've recently met a nice man who came to do some work on the AC at my step mother's house and he told me he's from some town south of Texas that only speaks Spanish, his reasoning is that because most of the population is Spanish so why learn English, I asked if the traffic signs are in Spanish too he said both languages but all of the government facilities and paperwork has to be in English, it occurred to me that the only instance I would have imagined a population that speaks a language that has to deal with a government that speaks another is at an occupied territory.
Is it wrong to blame them from not making the effort to speak English and understand the culture?
Topic: "Multi-culturism has failed" (Read 5258 times)