"Our" East meets "Me" West

"They are busy at work, so it's ok if we borrow their car. They don't need it now, so they won't mind." Dom told me while we were in visiting his hometown car-less.

"Are you SURE?"

"Yeah, no big deal!" Dom said, while his eyes said, "Why in the world would this be a big deal?"

So we walked down a few streets over from his grandma's small house to his old high school friend's internet cafe to pick up the car. The store was full of Thai kiddos engrossed in screens covered with millions of blinking chat conversations, fighting or dancing computer games, or hi-five pages full of comments written in Thai.

While the wife of Dom's friend gave someone a password for a computer, balanced her 3-year-old son on her hip as he ate a piece of guava dipped in spicy sugar, she searched the desk piled up with business-type papers looking for the car keys. Eventually she found them, passed them to us with a smile, and then left us to our own devices as she unlocked the cashbox to give someone change for a 1000 baht. "What a woman! " I thought.

For the day we drove around to the ancient ruins, had special hot, sweet and spicy chicken soup for lunch, got groceries at the Big C, brought them back to Grandma's and then took the car back later that night. Dom gave the keys back to his friend, they chatted for a few minutes and we left.

I had this feeling of awe and wonder for most of the day, pondering at this huge difference between our cultures. I was thinking how weird it would be for me to randomly ask my friend I hadn't seen in ages to borrow their car and use it for the whole day, without them thinking twice about it-- as if instead of asking to use their car I was asking to use their bathroom. If I was able to borrow their car, I would feel paranoid and guilty all day, like I had stolen their precious treasure.

When I told Dom this, he thought that was odd that people don't freely share their possessions in America. He had noticed with his American roommate, if Dom asked to borrow his motorbike, he would make a huff-and-puffy big deal about it, let him borrow it, but eventually asked him not to because it was "his" motorbike.

Even though it's not stated, many Thais have an "our" mentality instead of "me". I love this mindset especially when it comes to the way they eat because I love to try new foods. In America, I will even ask people if they want to try my food, hoping they will say yes, so they will ask if I want taste theirs.

But many times in America, most people don't want to try my food because they already have their own and hardly ever ask if I want to taste their dish.

Thailand is a different story. When Thais have big meals together, they order what seems like a Thanksgiving feast number of dishes and sprawl them out at the center of the table. Forks and spoons go flying to this or that dish. We dont even pass dishes in Thailand, we just stretch arms. Many times when Im just eating with Dominic at a restaurant we will order two dishes and share both together. I can't wait to bring this tradition to America: one fountain drink between the two of us and free refills, bring it on!

It may not be very apparent to many Americans that we have this me-focus, but the rest of the world definitely defines us by it. One of my cute-as-can-be Thai co-workers has recently started dating an American guy. She anxiously questions me frequently about the differences between how people date in America compared to Thailand. One thing which is holding her back is she says, "American guys are so selfish. I don't know if I can handle that."

Of course I told her not to generalize, and tried to convince her to test this guy out before she compared him to the stereotype, but it hurt my feelings to think that our culture is known all over the world as selfish.

Thai culture isn't perfect either. The easy-going attitude about everything has led to a lot of political and economic turmoil. As I always say, every culture has good and bad in it, no culture is perfect. But Im glad that I live here, and have learned about this good part of Thai culture. I hope that I can apply it when we move to America. Yet, if I mess up, at least Dom will be there to remind me through his way of living life that truly--what's mine is yours.