Embarrassing travel culture shocks

[WildBalonz]

Since it’s summer and holiday season I thought it might be fun to share some silly or funny or embarrassing cultural shocks we’ve all had when travelling!

I’ll start with an incident that is both funny and embarrassing depending how you look at it. A few years ago me, my brother, his wife and her brother (my brother and sister in law) went on a trip all through China. We were on a tour bus traveling through some rural areas outside Guangzhou. We had a pit stop to stretch our legs and use the toilet etc and our driver proudly told us that the public loos we had stopped at had western toilets which were very uncommon in these areas. Great we all thought, however what he didn’t mention is that instead of individual cubicals they had very small almost like shower screens separating each toilet. Not much privacy at all! It made for a very embarrassing poo for me my sister in law and two other ladies on our tour 😂. I laugh at it now but at the time it was probably the most awkward and embarrassing experience our lives. Luckily she’s a good sport and we joke about it these days!

We witnessed similar in Thailand - people on scooters balancing rolls of carpets .
Comical

I like it. I’m going to borrow that idea if I go to china

How refreshing - I would love teaching in these places !!

Toilets in France in the South - holes in the floor but abdolutly rank! Never seen anything so awful in my life!!!

I’m sure you made reservations to back, sounds like a great vacation.kidding, that’s really scary and weird

I completely agree about work but if you’re traveling to a foreign country then you won’t have that choice. After reading this stuff though I’m never traveling to foreign countries.

Ouch

I went to Thailand. The loos were mixed. The mens urinals on the left. Open to everyone to see and cubicles fortunately for the ladies on the right. We all laughed as we had been together for about 10 days by then

I'm just back from a safari. 4 men ( husband and 3 guides) had to pee behind a tree. That was fun.

As for not pooing in a public loo. No wonder people have bowel problems. As long as you clean up after you I couldn't care what the person before me has done. If there were such dangers to public loos there would be a lot more illness about. Oh and urine is sterile so I don't know why people get so worked up about it

As a teen my parents took me backpacking through SE Asia.
We were in Malaysia for Chinese New Year and with the family we were staying with we spent a day calling into lots of Chinese Malay family homes where we were fed like Queens (friend of our family who lived in Malaysia).

I had been told it was VERY rude & even BAD LUCK to turn down food, and we got pretty stuffed over the day with (mostly) extremely delicious food.

At one house I was offered a snack from a bowl - I took a piece & it was dried bitter highly spiced orange peel. It was the worst thing I had ever tasted. For some reason I couldn't swallow it, so I tucked it into the corner of my mouth until I could spit it out into my hand. I held onto it for ages until I could dispose of it.

At the next house we were offered minted chicken feet. I can't even begin to tell you how horrendous that was but I find it difficult to even look at chicken feet these days.

Travelling in Bollvia and seeing women openly peeing by the roadside

I crossed my legs for hours on the bus

What did they use in place of loo roll?(shudders)

That old one! Urine is not sterile when it’s infected. It might be sterile in the bladder ( very likely isn’t) but on its way out it will pick up various bacteria.

When you gotta go you gotta go, surely.

You are weird. And ridiculous

It’s not really a cultural shock thing but living in Australia with a strong northern accent was interesting. Spent a good 5 mins asking for a bottle of Rose. Obviously pronounced Rooosaaay. Rather than saying she didn’t understand me, she just stood and stared, whilst I practiced repeatedly saying Rose in a RP/Ozzie accent. It’s quite a different word, more like Roesay with a strong upward intonation at the end! Got there in the end, I was pretty determined!

Some years ago we were in Bucharest Romania, staying at the Intercontinental Hotel. My husband and I were having a drink in a small downstairs bar. A chap approached my husband, and we were thinking he wanted to ‘change money’ (they like USD) . However he was offering DH a woman for the night. I’m not sure what the guy thought I was! I was rather offended, as I’m not exactly a dog! 😁

When I went on holiday as I teen I thought the bidget was for feet washing glad I was told it wasn’t 😂

Continuing the toilet theme, was amused on my trip to New Zealand to see signs in the airport toilets saying please throw toilet paper IN the toilet. Followed up by a longer message that essentially said "yes we really mean it, this is our way and our plumbing can cope with it"

Also in motels (widely) strong instructions NOT to boil noodles in the kettle.

What about on an 18 hour train journey?

😆😆😆

Many holidays in rented villas in Orlando when the DC were much younger. Always a big tumble dryer next to the washing machine and no one hung out. Even in those days, 20 years ago, it felt criminal drying clothes in a dryer. My friend and I would hang them over anything hangable in the garage which was red hot inside and leave them to dry whilst we went out for the day.

Also Orlando, the first visit ever to Walmart, where the cereal aisle had about 100 different types of multi coloured sugared shite that was supposed to be breakfast and where guns were for sale further down the store. The all you can eat diners where you could fill your breakfast plate with iced donuts and muffins or a pile of chocolate pancakes swimming in syrup when breakfast at home was a boiled egg and marmite soldiers.

The kids bloody loved Orlando

Not at all useless, I've had to change a plug for some reason recently.

Iceland. Pools, spas...you are expected to shower fully naked and then stand around while you dry. No one warned me 😆
The changing room was full of women of all ages, casually chatting with it all hanging out - teens, middle aged, old aged, not an eyelid batted.
I stood awkwardly, trying to discreetly cover myself up. I've never felt so British...

I wonder if having squat toilets actually pre-empts that by preventing (to a point) arthritis etc? There's also, in traditional Japanese life anyway, a lot of sitting/kneeling at low tables etc, which a lot of westerners probably couldn't do. It must be good for joint mobility.

Getting a lift in an expensive vehicle with my child with amoebic dysentery when on way home from Northern Provinces in Pakistan. Never so grateful and never so embarrassed and shamed to leave nothing behind but soiled clothing and nappies in the pristine mountain pass....still paying my environmental dues.