The stimulation was really good. I could see how I reacted to alpha culture, a different culture with my own, beta. Indeed, I used mostly evaluation to look at alpha culture. When I first arrived at their land, my first impression was that they were really untrustworthy, weird and disrespectful. This interpretation is wrong in several ways.
First, I perceived their actions of playing cards as gambling. This was wrong to interpret as such since I used my own cultural value and assumed that they were untrustworthy due to gambling. Second, alphans seem to overly enjoy each other company by hugging, talking and smiling. Although this should be described as description, I interpreted the acts as weirdness from betan’s view point. Indeed, this was wrong as well because I jumped to conclusion prior to understand what it really meant to be alphan. Third, unaware of the situation, I got my cards taken without my permission. Rather than trying to understanding the reason behind it, I evaluated such behavior as disrespect toward me. This evaluation was wrong in many ways. In fact, I was rude enough to jump in their game without even asking their permission. Then I judged their act as disrespectful instead of judging whether my act was reasonable and understandable. Another mistake was that I did not at all try to make descriptions of what alphans were doing but applied my own reasons and cultures value upon them.
There is one important lesson I learned from the stimulation. It is always best to create descriptions about other cultures, not interpretation or evaluation. After clear descriptions established, I should observe and try to understand the context meaning driving such behaviors.
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