To be honest, this topic reminds me of what my American friend said when he first arrived in Vietnam. He was struck because we have many different cultures and daily habits every day. I will illustrate the top three “strange things” Vietnamese does that my friend told me and made a comparison with things in his country.
To begin, when he just put his very first step in Vietnam, he immediately ask me why people here were running so fast. He wondered whether Vietnamese people were looking around or paying any attention to surrounding people or not. He also mentioned that in his country, they did not run like that, just slowly travelling on their right side. Honestly, I felt a bit embarrassed because there were also some motorbikes penetrating to other sides to run, but luckily, he did not notice much. But then after a week of living here, I no longer asked myself about that. I hope that he still remains his own habits instead of adapting our habits when returning to his home country.
Moreover, the way we call the waiter and waitress also strikes him a lot. Usually, if we want, we will just shout loudly to make the waiter notice. This is also easier for them to know and identify exactly what customers are in help. It is totally fine for every single person living here long enough. However, when I brought him to one of my favourite restaurants, as usual, I just shouted out and called the waiter to bring me the menu. He immediately stopped me and asked me why I had done that. At first, I was confused because I did not do anything wrong, but then I just remember that was the first time he ate at a Vietnamese restaurant so it was totally normal. Unlike us, they just raise their hand to make a signal, that is enough to see. Everything is simply quiet so that he was not used to our “noisy way”.
Furthermore, bargaining is also a funny situation that I have ever had with my American friend. He kept asking me to bring to the traditional market because he was too bored with the modern one. Obviously, our supermarkets are also as modern as their mall, but still at a lower level. Since that, I did not expect to bring him to any supermarkets here. When he actually had the first step in the conventional local markets, he was really excited about everything. He kept complimenting that all the stuff here was so cheap and then he was about to purchase all of that. I immediately stopped him because I am a native person, I knew how much that stuff was. I asked him whether he wanted it or not and then began to bargain with the shop owner. He tries to stop me since he felt shy about my action, then I decided to explain that if I did not do that, I would be ripped with a big fortune. Then, right after realising everything, he actually asked me to do more because he found it was so interesting for him to learn. Albeit embarrassed, I still shared some of my tips for him to apply in the following purchase in the next few days.
In summary, there are more things that are different between the two countries. Having a cultural shock is totally normal because it is common for every tourist when they first come to Vietnam.