Different Strokes for Different Folks

A traveller during his trip from Eastern Europe to Morocco can experience at least four different rites of kissing on the cheeks. Polish have three kisses: left face-right face-left face. In Hungary, the general distribution is reduced to two: left face-right face. In France, the number is the same, but the direction is reversed: right face, then left face. With all of the cultures mentioned so far, kissing on the cheeks is prevalent between members of the opposite sex: same-sex touch is much rarer. In Morocco, however, while left-right-left-right, four kisses are proper, they occur exclusively among members of the same sex. If you are a man, I definitely do not advise trying to cheek-kiss a Berber’s wife!

Every culture has different rules for what is polite and what is impolite. During the early part of the last century, Kálmán Kittenberger, a well-known Hungarian traveller in Africa, had a great deal of difficulty due his inability to belch. He thus regularly insulted his hosts, rudely refusing to demonstrate the tastiness of the meal.

These anecdote-material ceremonies hardly scratch the surface of cultural differences. Every human being is immersed in a vast sea of cultural expectations and habits quite different in each culture. ’Five minutes’ in Turkey can range from five minutes to an hour and a half. If an activity takes less then five minutes, ’one minute’ is usually indicated for the duration. If you have sat through a ’five minute’ period that took ninety, you might think that ’five minutes’ may last indefinitely. This is not so. Something lasting longer than an hour and a half will not be called five minutes.

Different cultures have different topics open to conversation. With the proliferation of Anglo-Saxon culture, more and more places adopt the American taboo of asking about a person’s income, even though money is one of the most widespread topics of discussion. In many cultures, people don’t talk about money all the time, yet asking how much a person earns would be as innocent as asking how many children they have.

Another topic is apologising. If someone is late for a meeting in Hungary (which is not rare), they will exert themselves explaining the reasons in order to diminish their offence. It is usually believed impolite and uncaring to keep the other party uninformed about the causes of their tardiness. In English-speaking countries, the opposite is believed to be true. Not only did the other person arrive late, they keep boring the audience with personal details of their lives that are completely off the topic of the meeting! A quick ’Sorry I’m late!’ is enough.

These examples are a drop out of the ocean. Some anthropologists have long ago discovered that the most important elements of cultural differences lie not in costumes and ceremonies. The real, radical differences are found in relating to space, time, tasks, personal connections and the like. Moreover, members of any given culture are very rarely conscious of the presuppositions of their own culture; they take them as granted. In order to gain some perspective on one’s own ingrained patterns one needs to spend long years in other cultures.

In today’s global village, we often believe we understand the members of other cultures. It might be useful to allow for this possibility, while at the same time knowing that cultures in superficial contact might be based on completely different presuppositions.

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