Foreigner says S’porean colleagues switching to Chinese mid-conversation feels ‘rude & awkward’

Foreigner asks for advice regarding Singaporean colleagues who switch to speaking Chinese mid-conversation

A foreigner recently took to Reddit to share their frustration over their Singaporean colleagues switching to Chinese while discussing work, something they found “rude and awkward”.

In a post on the subreddit r/askSingapore on Monday (1 Dec), the original poster (OP), a European who works for a global company, said that they had recently visited the company’s Singapore office.

It was their first time meeting their Singaporean colleagues, which led them to notice this particular behaviour.

Colleagues did not translate what was said in Chinese

The OP wrote that while their colleagues were “nice and very welcoming”, they noticed that they often switched to speaking Chinese in the middle of conversations, both work-related and during meals.

What added more to the OP’s frustration was that their coworkers did not bother to translate what was just said or explain why they had to switch to a different language.

The OP admitted that they found the random code-switching “rude and awkward at the same time”, so they asked local Redditors whether this is normal or if they should take it personally.

MS News has reached out to the OP for more information.

Locals assure OP that colleagues did not mean to offend them

Many Singaporean Redditors jumped in to explain that such code-switching is very common in multilingual Singapore, especially among colleagues who share a mother tongue.

They assured the OP that their coworkers likely did not mean to exclude them.

Many advised the OP to politely remind their colleagues that they cannot understand Chinese and ask to switch to a common language.

Some even suggested that OP humorously ask them to switch to Channel 5 — an English-language channel in Singapore — or add subtitles.

One user also said that code-switching in front of colleagues who do not understand a certain language is not unique to Singapore, so the OP shouldn’t take offence at their actions.

After receiving the comments, the OP later said he realised his Singaporean colleagues weren’t expressing dislike or rudeness; they were simply speaking the language they were most comfortable with.

Also read: ‘What are they impatient about?’: Foreigner claims he can’t understand S’poreans as they speak too quickly

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Featured image adapted from Art_Photo on Canva.