Huihua, a Chinese student, and Mary, an American student studying Chinese in China, were on their way to a bookstore. As they got to the bookstore, they saw a young man walking down a flight of stairs. In his hurry, he missed the last two steps, and fell on the ground. He struggled to get back to his feet while people around him laughed. Fortunately, he seemed to be O. K.

    Mary was worried. She found Huihua smiling a little and was not comfortable about it. “Tell me, Huihua, how could people laugh when someone fell like that? Do they care at all? Shouldn't they go up and ask the young man whether he was hurt?” 

    Huihua said, “they knew he wasn't hurt too much.” 

    “But I still don't understand. A fall is a fall. In my culture, people would do anything but laugh!” 

    Chinese perspective 

    This is another example in which the Chinese and the Westerner interpret a smile differently. As mentioned in the last case, Chinese people resort to laugh or smile when they feel embarrassed3. Very often, the person caught in the embarrassing situation would also laugh or make a joke, to ease the embarrassment. However, if someone gets hurt seriously, it will not be a laughing matter any more. People will help him/her instead.

    North American perspective 

    A Westerner would interpret laughter in such a setting as a sign of either insensitivity4 or, worse, pleasure that the person falling had hurt himself/herself because that person was disliked. A Westerner's response would have been to rush over, assist the person up, and to inquire about5 any injury by saying something like, “Are you okay?” If a Westerner fell, they, like a Chinese person, might attempt to make a joke out of the incident if they were not hurt. If two close friends are walking together, and one trips but clearly isn't hurt, a common joke is to say “Have a nice trip”— a pun6 based on two very different meanings of “trip”: one meaning a vacation, the other meaning “to stumble7”. However, this joke would be made only between two people who knew each other well. 

    中國學生慧華和在中國學中文的美國學生瑪麗結伴去書店。到書店時看到一個年輕人正下樓梯，匆忙中少踩了最后兩級樓梯，摔倒在地上。他掙扎著站起來，周圍一片哄笑聲，所幸的是他沒受什么傷。 

    瑪麗挺為那個年輕人擔心，卻見慧華嘴角上也有笑意，瑪麗看了覺得不是滋味。“慧華，告訴我，為什么人家摔倒了那些人還能笑出來？他們就不關心人嗎？他們就沒想到要上去問問那年輕人是不是摔著哪里了？” 

    慧華說，“他們知道他沒摔著。” 
 
    “我還是不明白，再怎么說也是摔跤。要是在美國，旁觀者什么都可能做，就是不會取笑人家。” 

    中國人的解釋 

    這是另一例中西方文化對笑的不同理解。如上例所說，中國人有時以笑來消除尷尬，而當事人也往往自嘲地笑笑或開句玩笑來緩沖尷尬。不過，如果當事人受了重傷，那就另當別論了，人們會上前相助，而不會一笑置之。 
 
    北美人的解釋 

    西方人會認為在這種情況下笑是沒有同情心，或者更惡劣：是對摔跤受傷者的幸災樂禍，因為此人不受歡迎。一般西方人的反應往往是趕上前扶起摔倒者，關心地問對方“你沒事吧？”摔倒的人如果沒有受傷，他們自己也會像中國人一樣開玩笑。如果兩個很要好的朋友走在一起，其中一個絆倒了但沒受傷，常見的玩笑話會是“旅途愉快”——這個雙關語利用了“trip”這個詞大相徑庭的兩個詞義：一是“（度假）旅行”，一是“絆倒”。不過這種玩笑只會出現在非常熟悉的朋友之間。