Listening to the Stories of the Other.

"You can see...they are hungry for fun."

My friend shared this observation with me last week, as gave me a tour on the Indonesian island of Timor. I was on a two-week teaching trip that included time in both India and in Indonesia -- as well as short visits to numerous airports in other countries around Asia and Australia. Tapping the riches of any culture takes a lifetime, and so one short week in any one place is hardly enough time to begin scratching the surface of understanding a culture, but it is a valuable exercise nonetheless.

I've made the case here that "culture" is essentially the shared story that we tell. It's the way that a group of people (however localized or expansive that group may be) expresses what matters, what has purpose, what is right, and what is wrong. If that's the case, then visiting another culture is a lot like listening to a story other than our own. If we pay attention to the sights, the sounds, the smells, the tastes -- well, even the smallest details begin to reveal the narrative below the surface.

Instinctively, we begin to compare our stories -- and this of course can be a healthy thing. Identifying what matters to a culture other than our own begins to shine a light on our own story. The ideas and values that you had just assumed were universal, you may begin to realize are not nearly as widely shared. And, ways of looking at the world around you that had never even crossed your mind radiate from other cultural groups in ways that are attractive and compelling.

Early on in my visit, I asked my friend -- "What are some of the values that Indonesian people hold dear to them?" I wasn't exactly sure how he would answer that, but I had in mind something like, "Family," or "Tradition," or "Education," -- instead, he told me that music was near the top of the list. I asked him to elaborate -- and he explained that music represented tribal identity, and so each tribe in Indonesia (and there are many of them) had a unique style of music (as well as a unique style of dress, and dance) that reflected that tribe's particular history.

While in the city of Kupang, on the island of Timor, my colleague and I were taken a parade through the city streets. The parade was comprised of each tribe, dressed in their cultural dress, playing their cultural music. It was a collage of stories -- and it was without a doubt, a scene of great beauty. There was an energy in the air -- laughter of children and adults alike, the shouts of friends greeting one another, the dancing through the street, the flair of color, all topped off with the sound of modern-day drums repeating age-old rhythms. Here are some snapshots of what we saw:

My friend explained that residents of the island didn't have much to do for fun. There were no movie theatres or shopping malls to speak of on the island. Life for the Timorese consists of hard work; whether farming crops for sale in streetside stands, or spending the day on a fishing boat after the day's catch, each day, like the one before it, is relentless labor. And so when the late afternoon allows for a parade, the whole city shows up -- if not to march in the parade, to watch, to identify "their" tribe among the masses, to share the stories of the other tribal groups. In gathering together and sharing their cultural stories, the island satisfied their hunger for fun.

The next day, I was chatting with my same friend about cultural differences between America and Indonesia, and something he said left me feeling sad. "Indonesians look to America," he explained. American culture is exported en masse around the world. We send it out via our TV networks, fashion magazines, and Hollywood productions. Of course, this is a severely distorted "story" -- American media doesn't even begin to capture the fullness of American culture, but it is, nevertheless, the cultural story that the world hears. And it is the story that the world consumes, admires, and strives to emulate. Cultures abroad wish to be like the images of Western culture they see projected on the big screen because they have identified this as the gold standard of culture.

As my friend shared this, I couldn't help but think that this was a case of wishing for the green grass on the other side of the fence. What I witnessed in Indonesia -- not just at the parade, but in the faces of the young men and women in the classroom where I was teaching -- was not just a hunger for fun, but happiness in spite of a very difficult life. The Indonesian people I interacted with stand out in my mind as a people who were affectionate, friendly, and yes, even joyful. When they celebrated my birthday, they did so with singing and dancing, and laughter that I so deeply appreciated (and, the cake was delicious too!). Meanwhile, American teens struggle with high rates of depression, sadness, hopelessness, and despair about the future. American culture is so inundated with entertainment that we are perpetually bored -- we have lost our hunger for fun, perhaps, as we have gorged on the countless selections of fun offered to us each day. Please don't misunderstand -- American culture has much that is good (just as Indonesian culture has much that is distorted by sin).

Seeing a different story, in other words, allowed me the chance to evaluate my own story, and it raises a challenging question: what criteria do we use to evaluate cultural stories? Perhaps both Indonesian and American culture evaluate culture on the basis of abundance: abundance of material wealth, abundance of entertainment choices, abundance of success, and so on. To have these things means to "arrive." Yet, as an American visiting this foreign culture, I can see that having these things (as in American culture) does not automatically equal a life of happiness and flourishing, and lacking many of these things (as in Indonesian culture) does not automatically negate the possibility of happiness and flourishing.

That's the value in listening to the stories of cultures around us -- the cultures near, and the cultures abroad. We listen, we see, we hear, and we begin to evaluate what matters? How do other stories get it right, and how might our own story have it wrong? Become expert listeners -- and expert storytellers -- helps us move closer to our own flourishing.