Let me lead by saying that this doesn't necessarily apply to all foreigners, this is just something that I noticed with a few of my friends who are from another country.
I love having friends from different countries. Differences in culture have always fascinated me and I've never passed up on a chance to experience or at least get to know a culture that is different from mine. I've always had this thing for learning different signs of respect, table etiquette and all other sorts of gestures that were specific to another country. I try my best to observe them whenever I hang out with people from that country and I try my best to be at least sensitive to cultural differences whenever there are differences in their practices and beliefs from what I am used to. I believe it's not so hard to be sensitive to other cultures. Merely having good manners and right conduct will help you get along with foreigners as I think that there is a HUGE commonality among the social norms of almost all the countries in our world. I personally try my best to respect the culture of other people so what irritates me the most is when I experience foreigners saying that a social norm in my country is "stupid" or "wrong". Look, we respect your culture, would it kill you to respect ours? It would be perfectly ok if you said that a particular habit of Filipinos isn't considered as proper in your homeland but to label it as "stupid" and/or "wrong" like your culture is the global basis of what is right and wrong is just plain irresponsible and, sorry, stupid. Also, when we are hanging out with you, we appreciate it if you teach us about your culture and traditions like table etiquette and other shit, but don't get angry when we don't do it. Don't forget that you are in our country. You guys are the visitors, not us. So if there's someone who should be adapting, it should be you and not us. Anything that we do to try to adapt to your culture is a mere bonus, so stop shoving your practices down our throats since you are in our country. If you are going to insist that people do as you guys do in your country, then maybe you should fly back to your motherland. There's a saying: "When in Rome, do as the Romans do." And lastly, the thing that irritates me most is when I hear the lame excuse that I was excluded from a certain activity BECAUSE I AM FILIPINO. Here are some examples: There was this time that I was invited over to a cafe by a Korean friend and after I got there, a couple of his other Korean friends coincidentally arrived. When they got there my Korean friend began talking to them, they invited him for dinner and I was left alone in the cafe looking like an idiot. After his friends left he came back and explained that he left me because he was "concerned" that his friends will talk in Korean and since I am a Filipino, I wouldn't understand and just feel alienated. Nice try, but that isn't concern. That's just laziness to be sensitive enough to acknowledge that you have a guest who don't speak your language. That's laziness to give a hint to your uninvited guests that you are there with someone and that you aren't actually free to have dinner with them. Never ever disguise your insensitivity as concern.
Once again, I want to remind everyone that this post does not generalize all of the foreigners here in the country. This is just some sort of rant about the FEW assholes that I had to endure being with. Your mileage with friends from other countries may vary and I hope that you get the nice ones, so that you can enjoy learning about the world through the eyes of their culture and also letting them learn a little bit about yours.
