‘Both countries are good at math.’ This video is a glimpse of how the Chinese feel about India
Naan, belly dance, Amir Khan and Bollywood were among the first words that the Chinese came up with when asked to describe India.
What do the people of China think about India? To find out, media company Asian Boss went out on the streets of Shanghai to ask citizens.
The first words that came up? “Naan”, “belly dance”, “Amir Khan”, and “Bollywood”, among others.
Those interviewed said that the countries had several cultural and social similarities – a large population, being good at math and being seen as hard-working by other countries – but were also dissimilar in matters such as levels of development and social segregation in the form of the caste system in India.
Many of their perceptions, said the interviewees, came from Chinese media reports on India. While a few spoke about news highlighting poverty and women’s safety, one of the respondents talked about news on Chinese investments in Indian projects.
Interestingly, though, several people confessed to being wary of believing India’s portrayal in news reports completely. “Organisations have their biases,” said one.
Other sources of information about India included Amir Khan films, friends from India, and Chinese friends who have travelled to India.
While there was some confusion on the state of relations between India and China, most people interviewed said that better relations needed more cultural exchanges between citizens. While one person said that India should tweak policies to encourage more Chinese to visit, another said that issues between India and China were political, and did not relate to the people of the two countries.
What do the people on the roads of Shanghai think of Pakistan? Well, there’s another video for that.