There is a term in Chinese I think about. Sometimes we say ‘this person 会做人 / 不会做人’ (hui4 zuo4 ren2 / bu2 hui4 zuo4 ren2)

Broadly, it’s like ‘this person knows how to be a person / doesn’t know how to be one’.

Sometimes it is applied to some unwritten rules like ‘know how to bring a fruit gift to an elder family friend’. Or like ‘bring a tasty treat to your mother in law if she really likes food and you’re at a shop that sells her fave snacks get her some’.

But more broadly it means ‘someone who thinks of other people’.

My grandparents / parents often said they didn’t care about what my accomplishments were or weren’t, as long as I knew how to ‘be a person’, and how to be kind. I feel that’s important to me too.

#Chinese #Languages