One of the main reasons I travel so much is that I find it fascinating to see how different people are across different cultures.
For new travellers, some of these differences can make people from other countries seem completely weird or just plain rude.
Simple things you take for granted as being done in a standard way — like checking into a hotel, greeting a shopkeeper, or ordering food in a restaurant — can have completely different cultural norms from what you’re used to, sometimes leaving you to wonder: “What is wrong with those people?”
Today I wanted to share a few anecdotes I’ve heard from travellers encountering the weird ways other cultures do seemingly standard stuff. I’ll emphasize how funny some of these differences can be, especially when you look at them from both perspectives rather than critique them as “wrong”.
We’ll start with a story my friend Derek Sivers told me about the way hospitality is done in India.