Culture Vulture

I was thinking today about Chinese people (funny that:-)I find the whole topic of culture really interesting. I was obviously expecting the change in culture (moving to China) but what I wasn't expecting so much, was the impact it has on language! For me, I now see languages and culture as being very closely related, much more related than I had perceived before my arrival here.
Whilst I have experienced slightly different cultures in England, Ireland and Australia...basically..I think that we generally think the same way. In China though, it is very easy to misinterpret not only what someone is saying..but also their whole train of thought. This could lead to major miss communication and misunderstandings. I have met some people here who can speak great English but have a lack of understanding, so you can ask them a simple question or speak an easy sentence and they have no idea what you are talking about...but their vocabulary is easily up to understanding what you have said??I think we are just on two different wavelengths. It is very interesting and maybe can't be explained so well with words and must be experienced in person to truly understand. I personally think that I am very lucky to have a few Chinese friends who are very talented linguists :-)they have actually managed to improve their understanding as well as their vocabulary which makes things easier for me. In a way there is probably a good lesson that I am learning living here as I am usually very quick to judge how or what people are thinking and form my own assumptions, but here there is a very great possibility that my assumptions are totally wrong..As a foreigner in China I think that you just can't read too much into things.