When Cultures Clash

It's the tiniest things, really. Little differences between my culture and the culture of some of the countries I am visiting.

Case in point: I was sitting there, writing in my journal, at the cafe in my guesthouse. I was looking fairly intently at the page, when the disembodied head of a curious Vietnamese man begins to float slowly, slowly down, looking over my shoulder. I could see him out of the corner of my eye -- I recognized him as one of the people that worked there. He was casually reading what I was writing, probably to practice his English, but maybe to find out my thoughts on Vietnam. He looked bemused.

I just gaped at him. If this had been someone in the States, the best case scenario would have been a gentle "Do you mind?". The worst case scenario would have been a headlock or an elaborate judo move.

The key thing is that I'm not in the States, so I have to accept certain peculiarities as cultural differences. But there are limits. If he had begun correcting my grammar with a red felt pen -- that's when cultures clash.