30 People Reveal The Biggest Culture Shock They’ve Ever Encountered

Moving to Bulgaria from England. In Bulgaria shaking your head means "yes" and nodding means "no". You don't even realise how hard it is to reverse a lifelong habit until you try, it's really disconcerting. (Also, if you screw up you look crazy, imagine asking someone if they want a bag for that and having them nod at you while saying "no".)

Edit: I hate repeating words.

In Chinese tradition, it is rude to slurp your soup
In Japanese tradition, it is polite to slurp your soup
Im Chinese that came across Japanese friend slurping soup, soo things got pretty strange until I asked him about it and he explained

in america, strangers smile at you when you make eye contact. back in my country, you'd get beaten up.

Went on vacation to an East Africa with my wife, who is East African. I was out an about in town and dudes were glaring pretty bad at us. It was usually me, my wife, and her female cousin in the car.

When we went to the market guys were yelling into the car rude stuff and my cousin actually looked shocked and sad "It was **untranslatable!.** My wife basically told me that the people thought I was on a sex vacation.

We also went to drop off some beans and rice to their grandmother and when it came time I lifted the 50 kilo bag (about 110 pounds) and through it on my shoulder everyone burst out laughing because Mzungo (white men) don't work around those parts and because, given the stature of the people (most of the men are like 5'6 and I am 6'1) it was quite the act of strength.

And there was the one time a poor drunk woman kneeled before me babeling and grabbed my hand and rubbed in against her face. When I asked what is going on my wife said she may have never seen a white person (we were well away from tourist locations) in person and was trying to touch my white skin.

Born in Korea, moved to US when I was 6. Realized pizza and hamburgers and hotdogs aren't the only things Americans eat.

Coming back to the UK after 8 years. So many high functioning alcoholics. I thought that was just a high school and uni thing. Nope.

As a British person I once went to France and when I ordered tea they gave me some sort of Lipton monstrosity with lemon instead of milk!

Of course, I was straight back on the nearest ferry home.

When I first moved to Ohio, I was in a convenience store buying a drink and I asked to buy some stamps.

The lady behind the counter said "Please."

I responded, "... may I buy some stamps, please?"

She looked really confused and sold me the stamps. Apparently in this town when someone does not hear you they say "please" and you are suppose to repeat yourself. I thought you just had to be super nice to people at all times.

Edit: Because people are asking, this is in Cincinnati. I hear it all the time.

Edit 2: Because people are asking, the reason she was confused is because the first time I mumbled, "Can I have some stamps" and the second time I mumbled "Can I have some stamps, **please**" with a massive emphasis on the please. She was confused at why I was being so forcefully nice all of a sudden.

When I went to Germany it was weird that girls were like getting away from me when we greeted. In Latin America, you greet girls with a kiss on the cheek. It's weird, cause I never really considered it a cultural thing until one told me. Before that I started to think, "Jesus, am I THIS ugly over here??"

While in New Delhi, my boyfriend (Finnish) and I (American) were invited to a New Year's Eve party at a hotel, by the manager of the hotel. It was great - a dozen people, drinks, music, fun. After midnight, people start dancing. A young man comes over and asks my boyfriend to dance. He laughs and declines, saying that he's sure I'd love to dance. So I get up and go to the dance floor with him, and proceed to dance about 2 feet away from him. Not touching, just dancing in front of him pretty much. Everything seems fine.

But it's not. For the rest of the night, people are apologizing to my boyfriend for how he's been insulted. It's so horrific that his woman was treated like that-claimed like meat. People mostly avoided me for the rest of the evening, with the exception of the hotel manager who apologized profusely and actually gave me a Rajasthani puppet that he'd used in a performance earlier in the night - as a token of how sorry he was about my humiliation. We left quickly after that.

The next day, the owner of the hotel sees us on the street. He comes up to us and tells us he heard about the way we were insulted and disrespected at his hotel and how unacceptable it is. We try to explain that it was my fault for not understanding what the dancing meant, but he cut us off. He wanted us to know he'd FIRED the manager for allowing that to happen. We tried to get him to listen to our side but he was having none of it.

TL,DR: I got a man fired and ruined his life because I danced at a party.