Human Cultures That May As Well Be Alien To You

[Spacescifi]

 

In my case, as an American, I see a difference in how service is toward customers depending on the culture of the restaurant.

For a long time I took offense, but I recently googled the answer and I no longer do.

 

There is actually a reason for it... that has nothing to do with the customer.

Tipping is alien to their culture, so trying to ingratiate a customer by being friendly is simply not done in their culture, as they get little to nothing for it

 No profit in it. Food IS the service. Quick and tasty food is how they show their worth.

 

Check it out if you dare, wish I knew this years ago LOL.

 

https://www.houstonpress.com/restaurants/why-i-dont-expect-good-service-in-asian-restaurants-6438650

 

What human cultures are alien to you that you do not understand?

 

Given our international nature... who knows? Someone may clarfify it for ya!

Edited June 13, 2020 by Spacescifi

[kerbiloid]

(Idk about S-E Asians, but looks like the SEA service style is just perfect.)

Waiters.
They put their hands on your food and want your money for that.

Tips.
Not your advices (nobody needs them even for money) but additional money to pay to the lowest piece in the service chain.
They make you feel guilty if you don't, and pay your money for that, instead of their boss.

At the same time they force you feel your superiority over that lowest piece in the service chain and give him some money to see a fake smile.
This in turn shows that from the pov of their company you compete with the lowest of their lowest, who of you two is bigger.

If the tip seems to be too small, they will laugh at you. If too big, they will laugh at you, too. You can't win.
You can just buy the paid demostration of fake obedience as a revenge in advance.

Being friendly
Did you come to eat or to buy temporary friends for a couple of dollars?
Are you going to solve their personal problems or just to portray a fake compassion if random "Jim" or "Kelly" actually starts complaining you about their life?
They bring - you eat, you pay - they take.
 

Quote

It's either no tip or very little, say five to ten percent.

I want to see a commercial company waiting for "+5..10%" to the contract price just because, and even saying that it's little.
Is the "tipping culture" aware about price lists and fixed prices? It's a fresh invention, made just in 1878, almost a week ago.

Commercial promotion of arrogance, vanity, begging, and duplicity, that's what it is.

2 hours ago, Spacescifi said:

What human cultures are alien to you that you do not understand?

After many Hollywood movies and many hours in Fallout, I still can't get why relatively rich Americans love those terrible wooden/drywall/plasterboard huts in XXI.
Do they not have enough bricks?

[Spacescifi]

4 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

(Idk about S-E Asians, but looks like the SEA service style is just perfect.)

Waiters.
They put their hands on your food and want your money for that.

Tips.
Not your advices (nobody needs them even for money) but additional money to pay to the lowest piece in the service chain.
They make you feel guilty if you don't, and pay your money for that, instead of their boss.

At the same time they force you feel your superiority over that lowest piece in the service chain and give him some money to see a fake smile.
This in turn shows that from the pov of their company you compete with the lowest of their lowest, who of you two is bigger.

If the tip seems to be too small, they will laugh at you. If too big, they will laugh at you, too. You can't win.
You can just buy the paid demostration of fake obedience as a revenge in advance.

Being friendly
Did you come to eat or to buy temporary friends for a couple of dollars?
Are you going to solve their personal problems or just to portray a fake compassion if random "Jim" or "Kelly" actually starts complaining you about their life?
They bring - you eat, you pay - they take.
 

I want to see a commercial company waiting for "+5..10%" to the contract price just because, and even saying that it's little.
Is the "tipping culture" aware about price lists and fixed prices? It's a fresh invention, made just in 1878, almost a week ago.

Commercial promotion of arrogance, vanity, begging, and duplicity, that's what it is.

After many Hollywood movies and many hours in Fallout, I still can't get why relatively rich Americans love those terrible wooden/drywall/plasterboard huts in XXI.
Do they not have enough bricks?

Two things. Actually three 

1. I cannot speak for all America, but I can say definitely that good customer service can and DOES go beyond fake.

Restaurants I patron regularly that adhere to that will ask how my family is doing, or I am doing. As I will them. Yes the whole tactic born of profit motive to a degree, but it does and can form relationships that are closer to casual than cold professionalism. Asian restaurants in general with few exceptions are either coldly professional, overly friendly as if trying to compensate to the point of making customers feel uncomfortable, or rarely the American middle that Americans actually prefer. Either way, food is usually good enough to compensate for any cultural issues, so in end the food taste quality DOES matter most.

2. Brick is used in older homes. Keep in mind too that Americans are used to cheap mass production. Things are buil to wear out more than to last... it's a seller's market you see? We definitely CAN build stuff to last, we can even build dollar store speakers that are plug and play without ANY battery at all.

But you never see it done for more expensive good sounding speakers since then you would never have to buy a new one.

3.  Do not expect a Russian correlation to American norms. Being fake/genuine carries a different sort of weight here. It's not as serious for one, but I can understand why some over there feel strongly over such, given post WW2 history... which was a time of upheaval and change for them that effects the culture doen to this day, especially the fall of SU.

[kerbiloid]

56 minutes ago, Spacescifi said:

2. Brick is used in older homes. Keep in mind too that Americans are used to cheap mass production. Things are buil to wear out more than to last... it's a seller's market you see? We definitely CAN build stuff to last, we can even build dollar store speakers that are plug and play without ANY battery at all.

I see this, just in the movies they depict such planks&gypsum houses as something lasting for several generations. Probably, just an artistic convention.

1 hour ago, Spacescifi said:

3.  Do not expect a Russian correlation to American norms. Being fake/genuine carries a different sort of weight here. It's not as serious for one, but I can understand why some over there feel strongly over such, given post WW2 history... which was a time of upheaval and change for them that effects the culture doen to this day, especially the fall of SU.

WW2 and fall of SU are not relevant at all. (What WW2 and SU in S-E Asia??? They have their own topics.)
I see the American tipping culture roots in two traditions:

1. Archaic countryside showing off, typical probably for any countryside culture in the world, having origins in tribal traditions like in Germanic sagas where gold is a measure of luck.

2. Protestant ethic, like "be good → must work → works hard → gets profit → is rich → must share → supports charity → gives some money to others → gives tips"

So, as the former is getting gone in urbanistic society, the latter probably stays actual in originally protestant countries with religious traditions like US.
In some other countries a demonstrative sharing is less popular. It's better if their boss raises their salary by that sum.

1 hour ago, Spacescifi said:

will ask how my family is doing, or I am doing.

Someone's family is a little bit not of their business, and such breathing into someone's collar would here look tactless, unless the restaurant staff is closely familiar.
Though, it's a known difference between RU and US cultures. If a person was needing your interest on his family and personal life, he'd said.

Also, why the waiter thinks, it's a customer's wife. Maybe, it's a lover. Then again, what's his business about it?

[Spacescifi]

3 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

I see this, just in the movies they depict such planks&gypsum houses as something lasting for several generations. Probably, just an artistic convention.

WW2 and fall of SU are not relevant at all. (What WW2 and SU in S-E Asia??? They have their own topics.)
I see the American tipping culture roots in two traditions:

1. Archaic countryside showing off, typical probably for any countryside culture in the world, having origins in tribal traditions like in Germanic sagas where gold is a measure of luck.

2. Protestant ethic, like "be good → must work → works hard → gets profit → is rich → must share → supports charity → gives some money to others → gives tips"

So, as the former is getting gone in urbanistic society, the latter probably stays actual in originally protestant countries with religious traditions like US.
In some other countries a demonstrative sharing is less popular. It's better if their boss raises their salary by that sum.

Someone's family is a little bit not of their business, and such breathing into someone's collar would here look tactless, unless the restaurant staff is closely familiar.
Though, it's a known difference between RU and US cultures. If a person was needing your interest on his family and personal life, he'd said.

Also, why the waiter thinks, it's a customer's wife. Maybe, it's a lover. Then again, what's his business about it?

 

I was speaking of the difference between our cultures, since I know that informs how we see each other's country and people.

Typically restaurant staff do not bother speaking of famiy unless you are a regular and you your family has come before.

The irony is that it is a Chinese restauranter that does this! But that is because my family visits randomly as individuals, and he will always tell them 'I saw so-and-so' come by the other day. He'd make great fodder for a detective.

I cannot speak for Russia, but I can guess that people are wary of each other like in Ukraine.

Since the Soviet Union was a place where neighbors could report their neighbors for being well... not the kind those in power liked.  And they would be taken care of (shipped out or worse).

Americans have never had anything quite like Stalin or KGB, so  people knowing each other's business is not automatically seen as a threat or suspicious.

Also regarding waiters... yeah, sometimes they get personal. because they are being flirty. Sometimes females think that will net them bigger tips, not realizing that I am biased based on service above all.

 

If that is good I will tip, even if a guy and I am not attracted to them at all.

 

Edited June 13, 2020 by Spacescifi

[TheSaint]

10 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

After many Hollywood movies and many hours in Fallout, I still can't get why relatively rich Americans love those terrible wooden/drywall/plasterboard huts in XXI.

Do they not have enough bricks?

When I lived in South Africa, my wife asked me: "So, in America, do you tell your children the story of the Three Little Pigs?" "Yeah." "How do you explain to them that you all live in houses made of sticks?"

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, Spacescifi said:

Since the Soviet Union was a place where neighbors could report their neighbors for being well... not the kind those in power liked.  And they would be taken care of (shipped out or worse).

Americans have never had anything quite like Stalin or KGB, so  people knowing each other's business is not automatically seen as a threat or suspicious.

I don't mean "business" as "source of money", I mean the idiom "ain't of somebody's business", so this has nothing to do with Stalin and KGB.
Why should another person put his nose into somebody's personal life when not being asked for that or being a close friend of the family?
Why should a waiter follow a person who is not seeking for his attention?

Also if bring the parallels with Stalin and KGB, the glassy doors of the home entrance look a little bit like "Everybody! Look! I'm loyal and do nothing wrong, and no suspicious company gathers in my home.", like somebody still lives in McCarthy and Hoover times, lol.
As well, the "Neighborhood watch" signs look enough shocking, though they have appeared with basically good intentions. When you and your neighbors are in good relations, you anyway watch who's hanging around their house and tell them, why need this Big Brother / Eye of Sauron insignia?

Edited June 13, 2020 by kerbiloid

[StrandedonEarth]

1 hour ago, TheSaint said:

When I lived in South Africa, my wife asked me: "So, in America, do you tell your children the story of the Three Little Pigs?" "Yeah." "How do you explain to them that you all live in houses made of sticks?"

Hmmm, good point, but OTOH, brick doesn't stand up to earthquakes very well. Even if reinforced with rebar to prevent brick walls from collapsing altogether, it'll still end up with huge cracks. Although brick stands up to fire very well.

A larger part of it is probably economics. I would think brick is much more expensive than wood-frame, especially if the brick needs to be shipped a long distance. Many houses in southern Ontario are brick because there was a ready supply of good clay in the area. My area recently approved wood-frame apartments up to 4 storeys high now, with proper sprinkler systems, of course. Again, economics: wood is cheap here, and it's a carbon sink, unlike concrete  and steel or fired bricks. But wood  is vulnerable to insects and wood rot if not properly taken care of,  as well as fire

[TheSaint]

12 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said:

Hmmm, good point, but OTOH, brick doesn't stand up to earthquakes very well.

I would think brick is much more expensive than wood-frame

Both points which I made in response. I just found the initial question amusing. In South Africa, especially in the interior, lumber is uncommon and expensive, so everything is made of brick. At our apartment complex the entire driveway and parking area was paved with red brick. It's all about using what you have.

[cubinator]

None are so alien that I could compare them to what I think extraterrestrial cultures would be like.

[Spacescifi]

3 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

I don't mean "business" as "source of money", I mean the idiom "ain't of somebody's business", so this has nothing to do with Stalin and KGB.
Why should another person put his nose into somebody's personal life when not being asked for that or being a close friend of the family?
Why should a waiter follow a person who is not seeking for his attention?

Also if bring the parallels with Stalin and KGB, the glassy doors of the home entrance look a little bit like "Everybody! Look! I'm loyal and do nothing wrong, and no suspicious company gathers in my home.", like somebody still lives in McCarthy and Hoover times, lol.
As well, the "Neighborhood watch" signs look enough shocking, though they have appeared with basically good intentions. When you and your neighbors are in good relations, you anyway watch who's hanging around their house and tell them, why need this Big Brother / Eye of Sauron insignia?

 

We already have a Big Brother/Eye of Sauron Insignia... and it surely is not the neighborhood watch.

 

Spoiler

 

Edited June 13, 2020 by Spacescifi