Paano tumagay ng alak sa tropa? Paano maging tanggero sa inuman? Pano magtagayan tuwing inuman?
Question: How is alcoholic shot drinking done in the Philippines? What is the person who pours the drinks into the shot glass from the pitcher and passes it around participants to drink, one after the other?
Understanding who we are is probably one of life’s largest questions. Some may think traditions are old and no longer relevant, and that they are unnecessary during these modern times. However, exploring cultural heritage offers a robust variety of benefits.
When all is said and done, who are you, if you don’t know anything about where you come from, about your origins, your family, your language, your own culture? In certain instances, when others try to assimilate us or when we integrate too much into mainstream society we lose these unique elements. We should be open to learning about these elements of our identity.
Culture can give people a connection to certain social values, beliefs, religions and customs. It allows people to identify with others of similar mind sets and backgrounds. Cultural heritage can provide an automatic sense of unity and belonging within a group and allows us to better understand previous generations and the history of where we come from.
When you're working in an international environment, you need to make a real effort to understand the cultural backgrounds, beliefs and attitudes of the people around you. If you do not, you would likely struggle to get things done and work well with others. Thus, self-reflection is important to the cross-cultural learning process. Without understanding that everyone has a culture, and that knowledge of one’s own culture is crucial, we have a tendency to reduce learning about culture to a manual-based approach, applying lists of dos and don’ts too rigidly and in the process stereotyping. Self-reflection begins with gaining knowledge about dimensions of culture and learning to apply these informed generalizations to our own culture. We thus develop a baseline for making effective comparisons about cultural differences and understand better why we respond in different situations the way we do.
Therefore, we develop our self-esteem and identity within a particular cultural context. In other words, without a clear cultural identity, we would experience confusion and isolation.
