Adaptation, integration and imitation

When foreigners leave China, or spend any length of time here, it is common for them to reflect on ways they have become Chinese.

Small things - such as drinking hot water, using WeChat or giving and receiving items with two hands - acquire a disproportionate amount of significance, as if thousands of years of complex culture, history, philosophy and social change can be distilled and conveyed through a few pat mannerisms.

But cutting in line or mastering the art of the squat toilet doesn't make you Chinese, anymore than having bad teeth makes you British or having good teeth makes you American.