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During a class lecture, our professor- a German man- asked a political question to gain an insight into the Japanese students' perspectives on their government's actions. However, none of the Japanese students gave any response to his question. In fact, one of the guys nonchalantly stated that he did not care. This has been a recurring case in our classroom, where the Japanese students would not speak out at all. Initially, I thought that the professor was being rude for putting them on the spot with a political question when the students were still in the process of learning English. Eventually, I realized that it was not just the language barrier but also the differences in cultural perspective that prompted them to act in this way.