Shut the Fuck Up!!! (And Let Me Watch the God Damn Movie)
So I'm at the movie theater near Clifford Estates in Panyu (don't ask me why I was in Panyu. I don't even know why) the other night watching the movie, "The Hunger Games," for the second time, and throughout the entire movie the Chinese people (there were no other foreigners in the theater besides myself) just wouldn't shut up. They just kept yapping senselessly the entire time as if they were not even paying attention to the story.
My Chinese is now good enough that I can understand some conversations I overheard and although I was surprised neither by they fact that they were talking nor by what they were saying, my lack of surprise failed to diminish my desire to jump up and shout out "Shut the fuck up! I'm trying to watch the fucking movie!"
I restrained myself however, and tolerated the constant, distracting side banter. Sometimes they would ask each other inane questions about what was happening in the movie such as "What is he doing?" or "Why is she doing that?" or "Is he going to die?" I thought to myself, "If only I could express the following sentence in Chinese: "Watch the fucking movie and you will understand it!""
The most annoying example of this behavior was during a particularly emotional scene in the movie. Suddenly someone's cell starts ringing. Of course they could not have turned it on vibrate before the movie began. Of course, they couldn't answer it after the first second or even third ring. Of course they couldn't possibly think to have the courtesy to take the call outside. No, the girl just let it ring a few times and then answered it in a loud casual voice as if she were the only one in the theater, or as if she were watching the movie alone at home. She had no regard for anyone else who was trying to be engaged in the story on the screen. She conversed casually with someone for a minute about some place she was going the next day to meet someone to get something them. When she hung up she then repeated the whole conversation to her male companion in an equally loud voice.
I know I have lived in China long enough that a thing like this is no longer supposed to bother me but I cannot help wanting to share my annoyed feeling here.
Seriously Chinese people. What the fuck? Can't I just go to a movie at the theater and watch it without people talking loudly throughout it, asking each other senseless questions that would be answered if they were actually watching it, letting their phones ring loudly and then having loud conversations on the phone in the theater instead of taking the call outside?
Why is it that Chinese people have no courtesy for others when watching a movie at the theater?
It's that same arrogant attitude that comes out on occasion where Chinese people act as if they are the only one in the world and whatever other people around them are thinking, wanting or have already paid 60 RMB for, doesn't mean shit. It's just like in the metro station or on a crowded sidewalk when a Chinese person will suddenly stop in the middle of the moving pack. They may be stopping because they have to answer their phone or simply because they are lost. Sometimes when I see Chinese people stopping like that for apparently no reason I think they might be confused or as the Chinese say "Yun" (晕). Whatever the reason for their seemingly senseless stopping in the middle of a crowd may be, i still don't understand how they can so easily lack the presence of mind to have the courtesy to step off to the side of the moving crowd before suddenly and abruptly halting.
I have decided that the reason is this: They just don't care. They don't think about anyone else but themselves. There are no standards for common courtesy in China. People in China are simply 不注意. They are oblivious. They don't pay attention to their surroundings and don't think or care about others around them.
Maybe this has something to do with the so called "Monkey Complex," or the idea that when there are so many people to pass by every day people are less concerned for strangers. This idea doesn't really hold up so well back home though. I have lived in large cities most of my life and back home people in the city still follow an unwritten code that is a standard of common courtesy.
The rules of such courtesy may be slightly different in China, especially when it comes to such situations as boarding metro rail, but in my mind for a movie theater or when walking in a crowd of people the rules of courtesy are more of a universal standard than a cultural standard.
All it takes is to recognize that there are other people around you who are entitled to your respect and then to give them that respect.
It's like that Russian guy on the train, Oleg Vedernikov. He puts his feet up on the seat and pisses off some Chinese woman and the whole country goes berserk.
I just want to watch a movie without people talking loudly throughout it but if I had even once raised my voice to silence any of those idiots in the theater, what would have happened to me? Would I be mauled by a gang of angry Chinese movie goers, insisting that I was being a bad Laowai for correcting their excessively discourteous behavior? Probably not, but then again who knows?
Any time a Chinese person offends a foreigner in China we are expected to let it roll like water off a duck's back. Any time a foreigner slights a local however, it's like the fucking Cultural Revolution has to begin all over again and any Chinese within sight or earshot needs to give the foreign devil a earful of how he is abusing "我们的人民."
It's like that poor African guy who died in jail after he argued with a motorcycle taxi driver. I don't know what happened. Maybe the driver was trying to cheat the African maybe it was the other way around. All I know from the news story was that the dispute caught the attention of other Chinese nearby who naturally took the side of their countryman. The African suffered some injuries to his body. He was taken away by the police and died in jail that night. It's a fucking shame what can happen to a foreigner in this country when he is trying to stand up for himself against the locals and their arrogance.
I know it's not all of you Chinese people who are like this. I know there are rude Americans who will act the same way in movie theaters sometimes. I am an American and don't speak for foreigners from other countries so don't make it a "Chinese vs Foreigner" issue. I hate it when Chinese lump me together with other foreigners who are not Americans as if all foreigners were the same just because we are not Chinese. I don't even speak for all other Americans. I only speak for myself when I say,
"Shut the fuck up and let me watch the god damn movie!"
Views: 679
Comment
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Comment by Stella Gao on July 13, 2012 at 3:54pm -
I am not going to argue because you are right. Sad about it
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Comment by Stinky Panda on July 13, 2012 at 3:41pm -
he limited resources excuse is something that I’m growing to hate more and more.
Living in an overpopulated area is no excuse for rude behavior. Look at Japan or Hong Kong for example.
And what kind of competition would you face in the theatre? Competition of shouting? Afraid the next guy would shout before you get the chance to do so???
It is a plain old lack of proper upbringing, empathy and no-body giving a damn about the 文明.
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Comment by Stella Gao on July 13, 2012 at 3:26pm
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As a Chinese, I feel pretty sorry about what happened. I lived in Europe and Australia for a year and most of the time when I am back in China, facing so many people and many rude behaviors, I just want to hide myself somewhere else. But I do understand it as there are just so many people and competition is so fierce that every one is afraid that we would be left behind. I try my best to understand it and also avoid annoying occasions like this one.
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Comment by Joe on July 5, 2012 at 10:53pm -
only when chinese face to foreigners, they become team
@Cooci
Sorry to say it but this is so true of your people. Not saying that it makes it true for you by the way!
When Chinese deal with each other it seems sometimes like they would be happy to see each other's families starve to death in the streets. That they would just as soon tear the flesh from each other's bones and eat eat other, if they were allowed to. The Chinese can be a ruthless, heartless, cold blooded society, especially when it comes to their own.
Whenever a foreigner comes into the mix of conflict, all that fake patriotic "我们的中国人！我们的人民!" bullshit comes out any everyone acts like its back in the 60's or 70's and foreigners are all villainous spies sent to destroy the "harmonious society" from within.
What a load of horseshit.
Of course American's are the same way but I have never jumped on that band wagon. Not even in 2001. That was a time of some of the worst fake patriotism ever to be seen in the US.
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Comment by Kris on July 5, 2012 at 10:01pm -
The point of the remake was to Americanise the film, like they did with The Ring, and try to sell it to American audiences... It would have blown big time. I was suckered into watching the American version of The Ring... Best nap I have ever had
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Comment by Joe on July 5, 2012 at 9:58pm
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@Philouyhnhnm
I hate remakes. I can't imagine that a remake of Battle Royale would have been better than the original.
I'm sure you have very strong opinions about what makes good film. I'll even bet you probably know a lot about film history. Battle Royale was a great film. Hunger Games reminded me of Battle Royale. If anything Battle Royale fans should be grateful to the Hunger Games. After watching Hunger Games I want to watch Battle Royale again, even more than before!
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Comment by Joe on July 5, 2012 at 9:28pm
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@Sean
Yea in retrospect I think it might have been a better idea to take the girl to see Madagascar 3 rather than Hunger Games. I think she was a little overwhelmed by the blood in Hunger Games...
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Comment by Joe on July 5, 2012 at 9:26pm
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@Kris
Ok I will bet the book is as good a read as you say it is. I wonder if it's even available in China...
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Comment by Cooci on July 5, 2012 at 6:12pm -
welcome to chinese chaos.
people in group or in couple go to cinema, after work or study, as a date. sometimes when i go alone, i wonder if they really care about the movies too--------its like, they find some reason for togetherness. just as americans to set up some parties.
if u say, chinese dont care about others around, lol, i wonder if they care about themselves either. work overtime, night life, sex without protection......
only when chinese face to foreigners, they become team as "us", u see the sands? each of them could be parted yet still could hurt ur eyes, when they r together, it become sand-storms. the sand-like charactor is very deep inside chinese culture, just as, born to be, or else to say, educated to be.
to be continued.
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Comment by Psykryph on July 5, 2012 at 12:28pm -
So all you die-hard flickie snobs can sit back and say I have no taste for great cinema all you like.
Everybody on here thinks he is some kind of fucking Siskel or Ebert suddenly. It's fucking hilarious!Come on, that's how people get about films, not that Ebert or Siskel opinions are any more valid though. I mean, Ebert rated Twilight higher than The Raid. I mean, just read the comments on critic reviews on rottentomatoes or the forum boards on IMDB....and I thought youtube comment ragers were bad...
But yeah, sorry, I'm just really vocal about my likes and dislikes for film, and while I never said Hunger Games was a ripoff, I know that the Battle Royale remake (which probably would have been infinitely better) was cancelled due to the release of the Hunger Games, just like del Toro cancelled the Lovecraft masterpiece Mountains of Madness due to the release of some shit movie called Prometheus, and those kinds of things piss me off.
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