Miscommunication

When you were a kid, before your family had some guests come over for dinner, did your parents tell you how to behave, how to talk? Here is a moral story that most Chinese parents tell their children on such an occasion. 

One day, a hospitable host invited four friends to his house for dinner. When everything was ready, and the food sat on the table smelling delicious, he found out he was one guest short. He waited anxiously, pacing up and down, and couldn’t help but feel grumpy. He sighed and talked to himself: “the one who should be here just won’t show up.” One guest immediately felt hurt: “oh, he’s the only one the host expects. I am not welcomed here at all.”  Without saying a word, he left.

Stunned, the host lamented on his loss: “Look! The one who should have left has left.” Now it was the second guest’s turn to feel hurt: “then who is the one who should leave? It must be me.” Without saying a word, he left, too.

Helplessly, the poor host turned to his last guest to ask: “what did I say?” The third guest seemed to be a good-humoured guy, and pointed that the other two was offended by his message. The host innocently defended himself: “but I wasn’t referring to them!” Upon hearing that, the third guest felt as if he’d been struck by lightning: “oh, so all that fuss was about me!” Without saying a word, without delaying for one more second, he ran away.

What a disaster of miscommunication!

Dear readers, have you ever ended up with your foot in your mouth? Or, even worse, you had meant one thing, but somehow the message was misinterpreted or distorted, into a totally different way.

Why does this happen? It’s simple. Communication is not a one-man show. It involves three parties: the message sender, the receiver, and the medium. If any party has a glitch, expect confusion.

A couple was having dinner. The husband saw his wife was giving him a dirty look. While he was trying to figure out what was wrong, the wife burst out: “after 20 years of marriage, even a dog can read what I want!” The poor husband complained in his blog: why couldn’t she simply say “pass me the salt, honey”?

You see what the problem was here? The sender believed that her message, in the format of body language, was clear enough, while the husband’s protocol was only able to process verbal code.

Thanks to today’s technologies, we have so many means to send out our messages, though some argue that face-to-face is still the most effective communication channel. Then what’s the least effective means? I’ll choose word-of-mouth, based on another moral story from my childhood.

One father was going out and told his son: if someone comes and asks about us, here are the answers:

Where is your dad? He went to play chess with a monk. If it gets too late, he will stay in the temple and sleep with the monks.

Where is your mom? She’s working in the house.

Where is that old cow? That old thing eating grass on the hill.

Please note in Chinese, he, she, and it all sound the same.

Shortly after he left, a guest came by. The guest slightly changed the order of the questions and transformed the family into a disgrace. He started with the whereabouts the cow. The boy answered: it’s working in the house.

A bull in a China shop! The guest immediately followed up and asked: “Where’s your mom then?” The boy recited his father’s answer: “She went to play chess with a monk. If it gets too late, she’ll stay in the temple and sleep with the monks.”

Unbelievable! How scandalous! The guest looked around and asked: “Where the hell is your dad?” “Oh, that old thing”, the boy answered calmly, “He’s eating grass on the hill.”

I don’t know how you feel. I have the urge to call the Police, or at least, send a social worker to check out this house.

What have I learned about communication? If you are the sender, make sure you are very clear about your message, and choose the right medium. If you are a receiver, and you hear something over the top, take it with a grain of salt, because chances are: it’s just miscommunication!