When I went people watching I decided to sit on 13th street out in front of the book store. Here are the three people that I have chosen to write about:
1. While people watching, someone who stood out to me was an Asian male student as he was walking parallel to campus on the opposite side of the street. The reason he stood out to me was due to the way he was fashionably dressed. This student was wearing clean, bright red shoes with a darker jean. In addition, he was wearing a white shirt with a cool design, a very fashionable, charcoal jacket, and designer glasses. Based off of these materialistic factors, I assumed that he was an exchange student. The reason this came to mind is because many of the Asian exchange students that I have encountered dress very nice. Based off of these observations, I assume that the Asian culture puts a high value on materialistic items such as nice clothes and cars. Although it is hard for me to admit it, these assumptions can reveal that I am slightly materialistic as well. If I did not care about designer goods, then I would not have been able to identify them one this student.
2. Another student that I saw was a white male who looked like he was in his early 20. He was wearing sweat pants, a jacket, and a beanie. I assumed he was on his way to class because had his backpack on. It was difficult for me to guess exactly why this student was wearing what he was wearing. I feel as if he was dressed casually because it was early in the morning and he had just gotten out of bed. However I made another speculation that this individual does not put an emphasis on the way he is dressed. I think part of the reason I picked these two scenarios for the way he was dressed is because I fight that battle within myself on occasion. If it is an early morning class sometimes I just throw on sweats but other times I wear them because they are comfortable and I don’t really care what others think about them.
3. The third person that I am going to describe was a male who looked as though he was from India. The student was wearing timberland boots, a light fade jean, a pastel blue button down shirt, and aviator style glasses with a blue lens tint. When I noticed him, he was leaning up against McKenzie Hall with his backpack by his side and smoking a cigarette. It was interesting because he was not talking to anyone and was just watching people walk by. After watching him for a little while, I feel as though he was trying to look cool. The reason I thought of this, was due to the way he was leaning against the wall and attempting to make eye contact with everyone who passed him. Although he was skinny, I also assume he might not be in the best shape since he was smoking a cigarette. The assumption of him trying to act cool and not being in shape I think was a subconscious rational for my dislike of cigarettes. These subconscious thoughts were not something that I realized at the time.
I like your overall interpretations of their characteristics based upon their clothing, but I do believe that based on your last description that the person was indeed Arabian, not Indian. I too have seen groups of Arabians smoking cigarettes around campus trying to look and act cool, and I disapprove cigarettes strongly as well. Not that I am personally affected by your assumptions of anything, but I am of Indian descent myself, so I can tell pretty well when such people are Indians or Arabians. Also cigarettes are heavily frowned upon in our culture, so I just wanted to put us in a brighter light, that’s all. But a person’s character type can be observed from the clothes that they wear, so good overall interpretations with that.
Hi, George. I am interested in the first Asian guy you described because I am a Chinese student. According to your description, I guess he is a Chinese guy because of his fashionable dress. Comparing with other Asian students, I think dress of Chinese students is the most fashionable and most of us are not exchange students but just come to here by ourselves. You said that the Asian culture puts a high value on materialistic items such as nice clothes and cars. I agree with you that many of us pay attention to materialistic items now, but actually this should not be included in our traditional culture. The reason that why we put a high value on materialistic items just because the fast economic development.
Hey Beichen,
I find it interesting how you are able to make an accurate guess which country the person I described is from based off of the way they dress. I also did not know that the materialism is more of a recent trend but it makes sense to me. China has been growing economically so people have more money to spend. If this is the case, I am curious what some of the values are that the tradition culture embraced; or is it possible that the tradition culture did not have much change they just added on some new values.