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Putting my Foot in it (Culture Shock)
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I was speaking with an old friend not so long ago concerning a recent misunderstanding she had encountered with the latest introduction within her family in the form of a Russian brother-in-law. She was telling me how she had found herself in an awkward situation which arose through what can only best be described as ‘cultural differences’. Her dilemma had led her to ask me the question, ‘When you’re over there in Thailand, have you ever dropped a clanger?’. I suspected her interest being somewhat more than just a little inquisitiveness and answered, ‘Who me, dropped a Clanger? A more suited question would have been how many clangers have you dropped while over in the land of smiles?’.
———-/———-
I have been embarrassed or found myself in embarrassing situations with regard to my innocent ignorance, innocent stupidity, or just simply my innocent weird sense of humour on far too many occasions to remember. Clanger would be an understatement, dropping a major bollock would be a more accurate phrase.
I am certainly not a well travelled person, not by any means of the imagination, but I have been known to venture across the English Channel on one or two occasions. Prior to my attraction with Thailand I had only ever visited a few neighbouring European countries on the old ‘package holiday’. It never really occurred to me for a moment at that time while holidaying on the Costa Del crime to allow for any conflicting cultural issues that may arise while on foreign soil (actually to be more precise on foreign sand) as most of the time I would be laid star shaped on the beach giving the appearance that something rather unpleasant had just washed up on the shore.
No matter how much I prepared for my first trip to Bangkok it just wasn’t enough. I’d read all the travel guide books; do this, don’t do that, say this, don’t say that and although most of it was down to common sense (a department of which I do tend to be lacking in) there were so many numerous things that one just couldn’t account for.
One would be forgiven when first experiencing a culture that is so different from your own if at first, like me you thought , ‘well, that’s a ridiculous way of doing something - you’re doing it all wrong - that just doesn’t make sense, the way I do it is far better’… and so on. Thing is, if you continue to think like that you just don’t understand and never will. Everyday things that might be described as the ‘norm’ in the UK my native homeland can be frowned upon in other countries, cultures or any other socially different backgrounds.
Sometimes the ‘cultural norms’ are so extreme one has to be very, very careful indeed so as not to unintentionally offend. Works both ways agreed but when in Rome do as the Romans right? Or at least try to. Which leads me nicely onto my first major bollock dropping over in the land of smiles (Thailand).
In the west, we tend to use our feet much more than for just standing and walking. We open and close doors with them, slide things across the floor with them; in fact our feet are often used as another pair of hands. For example if our hands are full we will quite freely use them to point to things or to hold a door open for someone. I was soon to find out in Thailand, to use the feet for anything else other than standing upright, walking or running is generally unacceptable. So to point a foot at another person or more specifically to point a foot at or anywhere near another persons head would inevitably cause a great offence.
Actually in truth I had been aware of the ‘feet thing’ for some time because for once in my life I had taken the trouble to listen and learn something from my elder brother. He having spent so much more time in Thailand than myself had forewarned me of the many potential cultural hazards. The ‘oh so wise one’ had given me the feet rules and how not to use them (feet that is, not the rules):
- Never sit with the soles of you feet facing someone or for that matter facing a religious image or the royal family, to be safe keep both feet on the ground when sitting.
- Never step over any part of another person.
- Never point or move anything with your foot.
- Never walk into someone’s house with your shoes on.
- Never step on the door threshold.
- Never ever place your feet near someone’s head. At the pictures or on a bus for example don’t place your feet up on the seat in front.
Looking back I have to admit he was right, well for the most of it. It turned out that the gentle bow of the head when being greeted had deeper connotations than first thought. For instance a waiter or waitress when serving on you as you sit at the table may well lower their head gently, stoop a little or even crouch down to be at the same level as you, this is to show sign of kao-rop (respect).
So, head good, feet not so good. Yeah, I got that, easy enough to remember. So, with all this hindsight and in good old me tradition having only been in Southeast Asia for less than twenty four hours I managed to go and ‘put my foot in it.’ Literally.
There we both were my tee ruk (darling)and I in Chatuchak market, in the midst of the hustle and bustle of Bangkok’s largest market, or to be more precise, probably the world’s largest market. As the dense furnace-like stiffening heat grew under the hundreds of endless canopies my tee ruk whispered to me the instruction, ‘Keep hand on your wallet dear,’ she needn’t have bothered I already had it covered and then went on to say (but this time holding her hand over her top lip as if to inhibit any potential lip reading pickpocket), ‘Has many thief’.
I just couldn’t believe the sheer size of the place, trying to describe it would be doing it an injustice but suffice to say it was just an endless kaleidoscope of colours, smells and sounds. The crowds were just packed with intriguing characters of every kind; crack-pots, cleaver dicks, students old and young. Small children were wandering around aimlessly, pretty women just wandering around. There were little old ladies bent at right angles from the hips reaching out to touch my arm, trying to attract my attention into buying one of their religious Buddhist carvings. Even as I was pulled away by my tee ruk with her words, ‘kuna parp mai dee’ (not good quality) the look of their beautiful toothless smiles on their lined old faces never altered. This market was magical, selling absolutely everything and anything you could imagine from the latest in the ‘techno world’ to the oldest of antique relics. From pet dogs and cats to not so pet full crocodiles and monitor lizards. I’m pretty much sure you could get anything you wanted here, you name it they had it.
As the midday sun reached its highest point we somehow miraculously found a small shaded clearing where some guy had seized the space to throw down numerous mobile phone cases, it didn’t take him long to see the Thai girl walking towards him with her foreign walking wallet (me). His eyes lit up as he spoke. ‘reather fone case’, he spoke in his best English - typically Thai having a major problem in getting his L’s and R’s the right way round.
‘Hmm… leal reather eh?’ I questioned him.
‘Collect.’ He replied with a wide cheeky grin.
I guessed what he was trying to say was correct, real leather. So with that I thought I would humour him by taking an interest and moving in for a better look. After all what harm could it cause?
If the truth be known I didn’t really want a phone case, albeit real leather, but I took pity on the guy and the prices he was asking for them, Well, I guess it wouldn’t have even bought me an ice cream back home and the shaded area I had now found myself in had been most welcome.
As I stood over the array of various shapes, sizes and colours of Phone cases wondering which one would actually fit my cell phone some Thai guy with a look of Jackie Chan (you know, the Chinese martial arts expert and movie star) came along side me and showed similar interest. He decided to take a closer look and in doing so he crouched down, knees bent, perched on his toes his backside resting on his heals and his elbows resting on his thighs he became delicately balanced in a squatting position. The seller immediately took a similar pose opposite him.
Nothing registered at this point in my head as to regards any of the before mentioned ‘hindsight’ I had received from my elder brother back in good old Blighty (remember, the head and feet dos and don’ts?) As I looked down, now towering over the two of them I noticed a phone case which remotely looked as if it may fit my phone. I turned to seek out my tee ruks approval but as I was too idle to bend down, oblivious to anything and without a second thought I raised my right leg and pointed my flat slip-on sandal towards the phone case in question.
This is where it all went horribly wrong. A look of sheer horror bestowed on tee ruks face, I looked back towards where I was pointing with my foot… Pointing with my foot! My god, it was only then that I realised that my big toe was protruding out of the end of my sandal and was right to the side of Jackie Chan’s right ear lobe. It all happened in a matter of seconds but seemed like an age. It was one of those moments when time stands still like in that blockbuster movie The Matrix when the film freezes and the camera spins a three-sixty.
The world was closing in on me as all eyes in the market were squarely focused on yours truly, all 200,000 pairs of them. I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me. What the hell was I doing? The guy crouched opposite was now unrecognizable as the guy who once held the cheeky grin, his smile now long gone along with his lit-up eyes, they, now defused moved as if in slow motion from me towards Jackie Chan whose face my foot was now well and truly in, then as his eyes rolled back again towards me his face held the facial expression of fear - somewhat resembling the one my tee ruk had just thrown me. I looked down and as I started to draw my foot away from Chan’s head, he turned to face me and with a slight tilt of his head I met his glare.
———-/———-
If looks could kill I would have died a thousand deaths (to be precise 200,000 deaths.) It was as if I had walked up to him and stuck my middle finger right up in front of his face while yelling at him to go f**k himself. Why did I feel so bad? It was a simple mistake any one could make, thing is, you really had to be there to feel the negative vibes. You could have cut the atmosphere with a knife, the silence was deafening. I’m sure if there had been such a thing as tumbleweed in Thailand then that would be the perfect time for it to go bouncing by.
I had broken the feet rule - big style. I felt a tear in my stomach, the thought of upsetting a local with my ignorance all be it unconscious was bad enough, the thought of upsetting a potential martial arts expert was most certainly mai dee (not good). What should I do? What would you do? I had to think quickly, on my feet as it was (pardon the pun). My brain was scrambled, I couldn’t think straight. I looked for some kind of signal from my mentor, surly she would know how to handle this delicate situation I had found myself in… Where the hell had she gone? She had scarpered, done a runner, buggered off and had found a safe haven a few meters away where she was now frantically flapping her hand beckoning me over.
Okay, so the way I saw it I had three options:
- Mercifully apologise and beg for his forgiveness.
- Play stupid and hope he takes some pity on the brainless farang (foreigner) and just hope he doesn’t drop me a round house kick to the temple and poleaxe me.
- Do a runner. As the third option wasn’t really an option - as there was nowhere to run, I did what any decent British responsible and respectable chap would do under such circumstances, I played dumb - it made sense (if that makes sense.)
With my lips pursed tightly together smiling coyly, my eyebrows raised with the slight hint of embarrassment and a dazed look in my eyes my ‘simpleton’ look was well and truly once again in place. I slowly retreated stepping backwards as if walking away from a grizzly bear… No sudden movements. (Not that I’ve ever done that you understand, but you get the picture.) It seemed to work, the grizzly bear’s, oops I mean Jackie Chan’s piercing glare turned to one of just disgust and with a slight shake of his head he turned back towards the phone cases and the incident was over.
However trivial it may seem to us as westerners I am almost certain he will remember my ignorance to this day. I most certainly did not do the foreign tourist any favours that day. I remember walking over to my tee ruk looking like a scalded cat and in trying desperately to claw back some self-respect I apologised to her for my tactlessness hoping it would compensate in some way. She was not impressed, highly disappointed that I could have done such a thing, ‘but it was a mistake, I didn’t mean to, I know it was a wrong thing to do but I just forgot and I’m sorry but I …’ blah.
All seem to fall on deaf ears; it was as if she just couldn’t believe I possessed such an unconscious movement.
‘Yes, I know you didn’t mean it,” she went on, ‘but I just couldn’t have believed you could have done such a bad thing.’
‘Yes but, it was a mistake I didn’t mean to offend’
‘No, but I just couldn’t believe you could do it’
‘Yes but…’
‘No but…’ And so on…
We were going round in circles. Quite literally as we discussed the issue we couldn’t find our way out of the goddamn market.
Joking aside all’s well that ends well and we can laugh about it now (well I can.) The rest of the day went great and some time later we did manage to find our way out of Chatuchak market and we set off back home with our bargains in hand – minus one phone case.
Well, that was that. There is no morel to this story the only point being if you have never suffered from culture shock, Thailand is a great place to start. Any human being, plucked from the world in which they best function where they most feel secure and suddenly find themselves in a culture much different as their own is certain to feel a bit strange. Some people cry, others like me will walk around with broad grins on their faces. Some will love it, some will hate it. For years things you had thought as correct, polite and friendly can be interpreted or should that be misinterpreted as odd, rude and even hostile, this is the essence of culture for me.
In my opinion read all you like, but it’s impossible to fully understand another ones culture without first hand experience, the best we can do is to be sympathetic towards it. It’s the minor everyday things which we take for granted that are the most difficult to get to grips with. The most I can hope for in writing this non particularly poignant story is that if you ever experience ‘cultural norms’ however absurd they may seem, try to be a little more understanding rather than misunderstanding.
I guess in his action to accept my innocent ignorance the Jackie Chan guy understood.
The End
© Bill Bobby
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7 responses so far
September 5th, 2007 at 5:38 am
Funny thing is, my girlfriend uses her foot to move things around (She is Thai) but when I do it she throws a fit.
September 5th, 2007 at 10:35 am
Also remember never to stand on a coin or banknote. It’s better to let the 1000 Baht note go, with the breeze, than risk a lynching.
September 5th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Yeah thanks for the comments guys, can understand the coin, banknote thing. Anything showing any sign of disrespect towards the king is seen as sacrilege - Back to the old feet and head rule. Mind you, I have to say I have yet to experience that one, chances of finding a single stang on the road side are slim.
Jonathon, your comment made me smile, but isn’t that just a woman thing?
September 6th, 2007 at 12:56 pm
I heard a story that a guy got beaten close to death in Pattaya because he glued a coin to the ground as a prank. People didn’t take kindly to that one.
September 6th, 2007 at 2:16 pm
One of the teachers at our school was sacked for glueing coins to his shoes to teach the children how to Tap Dance.
October 16th, 2007 at 12:17 am
Love this story. I still remember when my girlfriend (now wife) started dating I made the mistake of tapping her on the shin with my foot to get her attention. As you can imagine all hell broke loose! It made no difference that I didn’t know, was ignorant, was apologetic, none of it made any difference. It was as if I had spit in her face and nothing I could say would make it better. Of course to this day I keep my feet on the ground
And to Johnathan’s point…my wife seems to think it’s ok to kick me, because I am a farang she says, but heaven help me if I even point at her with my feet. Women.
October 20th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Thanks for the comment Steve. I understand how you must have felt with the ankle kicking incident.
Not long after the above head/foot thing I was having my photo taken with the in-laws. Unthinkingly I through my arm around the father-in-laws shoulder, real friendly-like. Being the polite guy he is, he never flinched (apparently he didn’t want me to lose face by asking me to remove my arm at the time). Needless to say I was informed later by my missus that he didn’t like my hand so close to his head and not to do this again.
‘Sorry dear.’
I never seem to learn.