Cultural Misunderstandings Can Happen in the US, Too

After a month working with the Family Practice residents at Indiana University, I have been happy to see that they are a group from all over the world; South Asia, East Asia, Latin America and Africa. They all really like each other and are all likable people.
For these young doctors, their second or third language is English and they speak English with each other, but they also communicate well in laughter and love. I see the new residents liking each other. It’s rewarding to hear the Pakistani resident learning to say good morning in Spanish so that she can greet her classmates from Honduras and Colombia. It is even more rewarding to see the residents starting their second year really love each other and laugh at their war stories like old soldiers. They are young doctors who know how much they have to learn, are dedicated to becoming excellent doctors and are caring people. It’s really a great group.
The hardest part of the hiring process must be finding truly caring people in a one day interview. Many people can fake being a nice person for a day or two, but by judging the results, IU seems to have separated the wheat from the chaff. I saw the difficulty while interviewing residents at the University of Arizona and in Ecuador, so I appreciate how much wisdom is involved in picking this group of residents. It’s a testament to the discernment of the people involved in the process and people who refined the interview process.
Just this morning I saw that cultural misunderstandings can happen anywhere, and can be embarrassing, no matter where you are. In Ecuador and much of Latin America, it is considered highly rude to walk between two people talking. It’s easier to avoid walking between people because Ecuadorians stand closer to each other than Americans.
This morning, I was walking down the hall. Three people were talking, one of them a resident from Pakistan. Seeing a small, brown person in a conversation, I kept making little steps to try to go behind her so that I wouldn’t walk through a conversation. Apparently, in Pakistan, walking through a group that is talking is not a big deal, so she kept making small little mincing steps to allow me to go through the group, not around it. We went through this little dance for about 15 seconds, then I finally remembered that this resident, although small and dark skinned, was not from Ecuador. I needed my second cup of coffee to get my brain out of first gear.
It’s a small thing, my little embarrassment this morning. I’m not even sure the resident would remember any of it, but I remember that I am out of the culture loop after five years overseas. My children are really out of the loop, since their last time living in the USA was almost half their lives ago. I personally love learning about the little things of other cultures, except for when I make a total fool of myself. I don’t even need to be in another culture to make a fool of myself, but it’s a convenient excuse.
When you’re on the mission field, if you haven’t made a fool of yourself at least once a day, it’s because you didn’t leave the yard.
Your ego, try to leave home without it.