Culture and Mentality, can you divide the two?

Last night, I went out to a very interesting establishment, the paramount of Lilongwe’s cosmopolitan nightlife. It was a casino with an adjunct bar with a dance floor. There I wandered around and gazed on at this “Wonder of the Lilongwe World” – and Lilongwe is a world unto it’s own. There were Chinese businessmen who were endlessly slapping at the slot machines, men from South Asia crowding the black jack tables, and a smattering of people of European descent floating about.
In the true Malawian fashion, I sat down with some men who happened to be of Pakistani origin and started to chat. They were well to do businessmen and had very interesting things to tell me about why Malawi is the way it is. I know that leaves the uninitiated wondering how Malawi is, but that you’ll have to extrapolate from my blogs. The subject of culture was a continuous theme throughout the conversation. It made me realize that culture does matter and can really shape a country and its national character.
America is a land of all cultures and yet no culture. Immigrants from around the world go there and take with their own cultural heritage and undergo a sort of reciprocal cultural transmutation. They are transformed by what they arrive into and transmute what they find already established. The multiplicity of it all made me forget how profoundly important culture is. I never over emphasized my own culture and never wanted to downplay the other effect of others. And for some reason everything in China just made much more sense to me, much more natural. Though my first impressions of the Middle Kingdom were that it was dirty, I was never hit with the feeling of confusion as to how the people function. Perhaps I just have a greater cultural affinity for those people, I certainly gravitate towards them no matter what corner of the globe I’m at. Here, in this unfamiliar land, I’m constantly in a state of mental consternation.
I don’t really understand the way the people think here and I don’t understand the underlying logic of their culture. There is a habit of starting something and not finishing it; which just doesn’t make sense to me! Why would you start something and not finish it? Just don’t do the project at all, right? The gentlemen that I was chatting with at the casino explained this as a remnant of the colonial culture. For quite sometime, foreigners have been doing things for the people of Malawian. All the various tribes have been affected by this in a seemingly similar way – they became dependent. Malawi is a politically dependent country, and yet not. The most recent case of the homosexual men, where they were sentenced to 14 years in prison and then pardoned, shows how international donors have pull on this country. About 70% of the government’s budget comes from foreign aid. This nation is not fully free and independent. Economic independence seems to be the dominant factor in determining political self-determination.
I suppose that is why the goal of our organization is capacity building. Just trying to enable Malawians to do more things for themselves. Money makes the world go round, doesn’t it?
I just had an epiphany! There are many different tribes here in Malawi with differing cultures. What is really puzzling me isn’t so much the culture of the people as it is there mentality. Which makes me think that the underlying root is more economic than anything else. But I’m still not sure; I’ll continue trying to figure it out.
Any thoughts from the outside world? I’m right here in the thick of it and I’m definitely confused.