You can choose to be a part of a certain culture or cultures, but there will always be a greater culture that influences what you do and how you think.

Knowing something is offensive and doing it anyway is the same thing.

That's easy to say until it happens.



A part of expressing yourself is earning the respect to get your message across. Part of earning respect is being respectful. If you have no respect for anything but yourself, no one will have any respect for you. What you are trying to express will never be heard.

The mention of a "chicken sashimi" has me both curious and nauseous.

Are we talking completely raw chicken, or chicken chemically "cooked" with an acid instead of over a heat source?

Though I am not attracted to the still squirming versions of my beloved sashimi (fish!) I have no qualms about raw fish flesh consumption. However, being all too familiar with poultry processing just the thought ingesting raw chicken is enough to send me running the other direction. And I don't turkey, even if its well cooked. Once in a while I will have an over done wing, but that is generally my limit.

Easier said than done.
I'm American, and while I'm pretty open minded about other cultures, I'm still grounded in my own, as well as the rest of us. If someone were to flip me the middle finger, or stick their tongue out at me, I would be offended. Why? Because in America, those are offensive gestures. However, in other parts of the world, these are friendly greetings.

It's not that they might not know about YOUR culture, it's that you probably don't know about theirs and have no way to know if they're offending you or not.

Iv watched several customers in Japanese restaurants in the heart of DC actually stab their food with chop sticks. Now this is of course funny and yet sad. What makes it worse is their forks available why these people never ask for forks is beyond me. So i actually ask a customer who was sitting across from me why he was stabbing his food he told this is the way they eat in China and its rude to eat Chinese food any other way (did i mention we were at a Japanese restaurant):eek: . All i could do was stare then face palm and go back to eating my meal.

You should've taken a pic. and posted it here.

Im pretty sure chinese people don't stab their food in china either.
Trust me, I'm chinese. They use chopsticks too.

It's all very usual for different cultures.

When I went to live in japan, I was constantly worried that I may offend if I didn't copy certain aspects of their culture.

I actually then realized that it didn't make any difference, and at the end of the day, I simply became natural, and was well respected for that.

On the other hand, I met foreigners that wanted to become Japanese, and it just looked so un-natural for both Japanese and foreigners alike.

Cultures are always a fun part of travelling.

That's also confusing for me.

It's rude in Japan to "stab" your food with chopstick's.

I could not understand why Chinese would stab their food either because whilst I realize it was a Japanese restaurant with pointy end chopsticks, Chinese chopstick's are very broadly rounded on the tips and would be difficult to stab .

I have found that my Western people who cannot use chopstick's well, and lack the rules of Asian etiquette, that they often stab their food whilst attempting to master the fine art of eating with chopsticks.

Completely raw, fresh from a chicken slaughtered (usually) that day.

There is chicken rated for raw consumption, and chicken that is not. Pretty much anything you would find at a supermarket is way into the "not" territory even in Japan. Imported chicken is never approved. The type that is rated for raw consumption is much more expensive due to a difference in rearing and processing the chicken. Near our house is a place that processes chicken for raw consumption. Every morning, a truck shows up with cages of living chickens. You ask for a chicken and they slaughter and pluck it (or rather, steam the feathers off) and hand it over within minutes. The actual butchering is done back at the restaurant.

Having had a relative work in a poultry processing plant in the US... I would NEVER EVER EVER eat raw chicken there. There is a reason they tell you to make sure you cook it through and through in the US.