a time for manners...

Manners are an interesting thing to consider, really. I have just been at a German course and we discussed (among other things) what it means to be "civilised" ... It was actually quite amusing, but it got me thinking. Personally, I don't like the word (un)civilised, and what we were really talking about was manners, being polite and the like.

For example, I don't know about where you live, but here in Australia if you were invited to someone's house at 7pm you would be very unlikely arrive at 7pm (unless you happened to know the person really did want you there then). It would be considered much more normal to arrive at 7:15pm at the earliest, and possibly closer to 7:30pm. Why? You may well ask; it's hard to say. I guess we're just a rather laid back society and perhaps we're not that great at organising ourselves. But most Australians would probably agree with me that somehow it's not the done thing to arrive "early" (ie, at the specified time), since we know that we ourselves probably wouldn't be ready for our guests if they were to come at 7pm... we need that extra 15 minutes to half an hour to be completely prepared.
On the other hand, a German family (just as a convenient example cos we were speaking about them) would not be likely to be impressed if you turned up 15 minutes late... They'd just think it was downright rude of you. And they might well be right... But it's interesting how different cultures approach things differently.
As a personal example of this, I only just realised this morning what my exchange partner was angry with me for... When I was over in Germany I was a little bit shy and perhaps not as talkative as I might be here - I had difficulty expressing things I wanted to say in German so I wasn't all that confident. But I still thought it was weird that my partner got so annoyed at me, because she said I wasn't being very friendly. I didn't see what I'd done wrong, and the example she gave me was how I'd supposedly been really unwilling to talk to one of her friends when he was trying to be friendly.
Now, in Australia (and Engliand too but not worldwide), if someone says "How are you?" then you're expected to give a pretty non-committed answer. Something along the lines of "fine thanks" or "not too bad!"
Unfortunately, this is not usually the case in Germany... so when I was asked something along the lines of "how are you" I would, quite naturally for me, give a reply along the likes of "good thanks" and fully expect a more detailed question to follow. However, since the person I was talking to was German and therefore not quite so used to our complex array of "throwaway"* lines, he thought I was strange and uncommunicative.
*eg. "how are you" "I'm cold/hot" "Had a good week?" and so on. Sometimes it's hard to pick when these are used for throwaway purposes and when the person asking wants a more detailed response...

So much for that then. Oh and a useful(/less) German proverb:

Andere Länder, andere Sitten
Different countries, different customs

Oh, here's another odd habit: Wearing shoes inside the house. In my house we take our shoes off to come inside. We picked up the habit in Singapore (when we lived there) and it suits me quite well - I can spend most of the time without any shoes on. On the other hand, I got some very funny looks from my exchange partner's boyfriend when he saw a was walking around the house barefoot. I don't think he'd have cared about socks, that's what we all wore. But apparently it's considered odd to not be cold in winter, even with central heating...

Can you think of different customs people have, that might be seen as very strange by people in other countries?