Sorry, Not Sorry: Cross-Cultural Triggers and How to Respond
We have an unusually large kitchen for where we live, but an unusually small fridge. At 5’2” I look down on it, and our 9x12 Pyrex dish with the snap-on lid only fits in perched at a diagonal. Essentially, trying to make everything fit can easily become a game of Tetris, and last week I lost the game.
Without thinking through the consequences, I set a glass bottle of Sprite on a higher shelf on the fridge door to make room for something else. I’m sure you will not be surprised at what happened a little bit later, when I opened the fridge, with a five-month-old on my hip and feet unsuspectingly bare, intending to show our house helper Irene which vegetables she could chop for dinner. The Sprite crashed to the ground in a mess of sticky soda and green glass shards.
Right away, Irene exclaimed, “oh, sorry, sorry,” and continued to say that on repeat as she rushed to find shoes I could put on and began sweeping up the pieces of glass. And, as she selflessly began clearing up my mess, I’m ashamed to admit that I felt it — that sting of irritation, something rubbing me the wrong way culturally.
Where I live in East Africa, a response like Irene’s is common. When you do something wrong, people around you say sorry. Maybe where you live, too? For some reason, it drives me crazy. My rational understanding knows it is being used to express empathy, but to my Western ears, saying sorry in this way always comes across like an apology. Therefore, when someone says it to me, it always triggers a defensive reaction. I get irritated when it seems like they are apologizing for something I did.
Maybe this stems from my American sense of individualism, or maybe this is something much more specific to my own personality (I’m a conflict-averse Enneagram 9 and therefore really don’t like what seems to be someone drawing attention to what went wrong with non-stop sorries). But I’ve come to realize that I have this reaction every time to something that is so small but fairly common in my host culture.
In this instance, my irritation spilled out into me snapping at Irene – Irene, who was literally cleaning the broken mess at my feet – “Irene! It was my fault, not yours. You do not need to apologize!”
“Yes,” she said, “but it has happened.”
“True,” I sighed, a little chagrined, “it has happened.”
Can you relate? Maybe you are thinking of your own tiny ‘cross-cultural triggers’ even now — those tiny things that bring out an instinctual irritation in you, whether its warranted or not (but we all know it’s probably not). I don’t like what these reactions say about me: that I’m still so quick to assume my perspective is the right one, and I’m still so slow to check my response, often letting that irritation seep into my attitude and tone.
So how can I change?
I once heard a great tip from a fellow expat: always ask a question instead of making a statement when you see something that is different from what you’re used to. Our statements often contain our judgments. For example, notice the difference in asking, “why is there a group of men gathered over there right now,” as opposed to stating, “wow, look at that group of men just sitting around in the middle of the day!” Now, this might sound like Cross Cultural Interactions 101, but so often I fail to do this myself. Asking questions instead of reacting can serve as a good tool to help keep my cross-cultural irritation in check.
In order to seek to understand instead of judge, here are three questions I want to start asking myself when cross-culture irritation creeps in:
1. What am I projecting?
2. What is the intent?
3. What can I learn from this?
In the saga of the broken Sprite, my internal dialogue guided by these questions could have sounded like this:
1. I think I could be projecting my own guilt at doing something that caused a problem/inconvenience for someone else (did I mention I’m an Enneagram 9?). Now, that feeling is being amplified back at me when someone else seemingly apologizes for it.
2. The intent was empathy. It was not to make me feel bad, but actually to do the opposite — to comfort me in this situation. And, as Irene stated, it’s just acknowledging that something happened — not necessarily that there was fault.
3. And what can I learn? Well, East Africans value community over individualism, so when something affects one person, it affects all of us. In situations like this, maybe foregoing my opposite American instincts of individualism over community could lead to deeper connection and loving my neighbor well.
I’ve lived cross-culturally for most of my life, but I still have a lot to learn. I want to be intentional in doing the work of being respectful toward my host culture and local friends. While it may be uncomfortable and humbling to acknowledge and deal with my own less-than-impressive reactions, I believe in the importance of it. Next time I feel that sting of irritation with the culture — I want to check myself in the moment. Rather than bring my presumptions to the table, I want to choose the posture of a learner, instead.
Have you ever been bothered by something in your host culture, and later figured out a healthy way to handle it? What was it and how did you finally stop letting it irritate you? Share it with us in the comments!
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