HIDDEN MEANINGS - BREAKING THE CODE

One of the great things I like about travel is the opportunity to meet different people and get an insight into persons from different cultures. I spent the Christmas holidays in the United States, and even with distancing and restricted movements, I was still able to interact with a few new masked faces and enjoy exchanges with Americans as well as persons from various other cultures.

One particular interaction however got off to a very rocky start and tested every last bit of my interpersonal and cross cultural communication skills. It came about from the routine request for Uber services to pick me up at my hotel and take me to the train station. I was able to track the Uber's progress, and then the app told me that my driver had arrived…… except that he had not. I was standing ready and waiting at the pick up location, but there was no vehicle in sight despite what the app said. I got a message from the driver saying "I am here", and therein began a frustrating exchange between us. After much backing and forth-ing of several text messages doing the “I am here, where are you?” merry dance with neither party going anywhere!

I eventually called the driver thinking that verbal communication would be smoother than texting each other. Instead of bringing some clarity to the exchange, I found myself descending down a deeper tunnel of confusion. I realized from his accent and halting English that he was not a native English speaker, so I slowed down my speech and explained as clearly as I could that it was a big property, and that he had to drive into the property from the gate and come all the way down to the building marked "Reception".

"I am here" he kept insisting. "No you're not!"I insisted back losing patience by the minute in exchange for a growing anxiety that the buffer time I had built in was fast being eroded and that I might be in danger of missing my train - the last one for the day!

Finally after several anguishing minutes, the driver pulled up at the location, and as he took his annoyance out on my unsuspecting luggage, he simultaneously admonished me for not properly explaining to him the exact location of the building where I had been waiting. "Next time you say 'go behind' " he repeated over and over again, using gesticulations to enhance his point. “I told you to drive all the way in!” I retorted, not hiding my annoyance. Eventually we called a tense truce - I was just relieved to be finally on my way, but as I sat stewing in the back of the car, I couldn't help but think what a major pickle we had gotten ourselves into just over a few ill chosen words! I was using phrases like "drive all the way in" and "come straight down the driveway", thinking it was abundantly clear what I meant, but the driver was listening for a phrase such as "go behind" which would have clued him into the fact that there were other buildings behind the first building that he had apparently stopped at near to the entrance to the property. Alas, I couldn't get into his head, and he couldn't get into mine, so there we were stuck at a crossroads of mismatched prepositions and going around in circles.

You're probably thinking that this was just a language barrier - and indeed it was. But incidents of cross cultural miscommunication often start with a ‘simple’ language barrier, and can, if not checked, descend into a complete communication train wreck which goes well beyond a mere snafu with inadequate vocabulary. Indeed, it can sometimes be the stumbling block that gets in the way of building bridges and new relationships. Communication as we all know, is a two way street. It is in its basic form, the imparting or exchanging of information, but the deeper meaning of communication goes beyond the simple transmission of information. True communication requires an actual element of success in transmitting or imparting that information. The sender usually encodes their message in a mixture of words and non-verbal communication; if the recipient is not able to decode it to glean the same understanding as the sender, then communication has failed. 

As the driver and I set out on the long, mostly silent ride to the train station, my annoyance simmered down from a high flame to a slow boil, and the problem-solving cross culturalist part of my brain kicked in to gear. I asked myself what I could have done differently to have avoided this confusion and unnecessary imbroglio. I could I acknowledged in retrospect, have tried not to get so heated and frantic, and tried instead to use a different turn of phrase or speak even slower than I did in order to convey my location to the driver. Maybe drawing a virtual map I reflected, would have helped him to figure out where I was in relation to where he was.

For his part, the driver who kept sending me messages in his mother tongue which I would then have to translate using the app, could also have done the same with my messages. Translating them into his native tongue would have been a huge help in understanding what I was trying to explain to him. Either way, we both could have done a better job at encoding and decoding and this for me was one of the big takeaways from the unpleasant exchange.

When living in another culture or interfacing with persons from a different culture we often get easily frustrated or impatient when we’re not getting our point across. It is easy to misunderstand not just words, but tone, body language and other non-verbal cues.

The answer when you see things spiralling in the wrong direction, is often to slow down, exercise patience and try again another way. Try not to assume that the other person has understood what you just said and is just being deliberately obtuse. They may have heard it, but not necessarily decoded it. A different approach and different wording might unlock your unwitting encoding. Similarly, if you are not understanding what the other person is trying to communicate, try asking them nicely to say in a different way. It’s easy to get annoyed and frustrated, but that won’t actually solve anything. Sometimes the decoding does involve getting into the other person’s head a little, or seeing things from their perspective.

Another takeaway for me as I reflected, was the recognition that both parties had been making assumptions. The Uber Driver was making the assumption that I would be waiting at the front of the property by the gate, and I was assuming that he being from the area was familiar with the property, or would figure out that since it was a hotel property, he needed to go beyond the gate to find me at the main Reception building. Sometimes our preconceived notions and assumptions get firmly stuck in our head and prevent us from seeing things any other way. The moment we let go of our assumptions and open our mind to other possibilities, we begin to really hear what the other person is saying and the decoding process becomes easier because it is no longer blocked by an inflexible, fixed idea or notion.

Cross cultural exchanges can be difficult, no doubt about it, but when you finally cross the bridge or make it over the last communication hurdle, you can usually take note of the lessons learnt and go on to enjoy a great experience. In the end, I made it to the station in time to catch my train and to move on to my next intriguing adventure.

All’s well that ends well -  once you break the code and get ‘behind’ the hidden meaning!