Activity 3　Reading and Understanding

Read the following passage and try to get some cultural knowledge.

Gift Giving Tips (https://www.daowen.com)

Just like Chinese, westerners give gifts on many occasions, such as on birthdays of good friends, at weddings, at Christmas and some other holidays, when someone achieves an honor or gets a promotion, and on a farewell visit to a good friend, etc. Although gifts are always welcome, it is not necessary to exchange gifts all the time. Generally speaking,westerners exchange gifts only among good friends. Therefore, it’s inappropriate to give gifts to casual acquaintance. Even if you are good friends, if you give them too many gifts,they will feel uncomfortable too, because they don’t know how to reciprocate. Usually when you are invited to dinner, it is absolutely unnecessary to bring a gift except on special occasions, for example when you are going to be an overnight or weekend guest. If you wish to bring something, in most cases, the gifts should always be small, simple and inexpensive.You might bring some sweets or some small toys for the children or a book, some flowers, a bottle of wine etc., for the host or the hostess. If you like, you can wrap the gifts, but wrapping is not always necessary. If you want to make your gifts special, you can bring some typical Chinese goods, such as Chinese tea, Chinese book markers, Chinese paper cuts,Chinese paintings, or other things like that, or even you can cook a Chinese dish and bring it with you. Westerners prefer to open a gift at once and admire it. They would thank you and make some comments about the gift’s beauty or practicality, so that you know your gift is highly appreciated. Westerners value homemade things. When they ask you whether the gift is homemade, in fact they are flattering you. They are trying to tell you that you are skillful and talented enough to make it.