When we travel, we discover that the way we do things isn’t always the correct one. That our culture is only one among so many. And that human beings, fundamentally, have the same needs no matter their differences.

All this is very lovely. But when I hear an Indian burping loudly on the table beside me, it makes me, like my mother, want to scold him and follow up with a lesson on good manners.

When I see a man collecting audible phlegm in his throat before firing it with gusto on the sidewalk, I’m urged to start a little chat on the basics of hygiene.

When I feel a woman madly shoving me to steal my place in line, my instinct is to yell, “Hey sister, can’t you see I was here first?”

And when I’m surrounded by stares when I walk on the street or sit in a restaurant? Inside I scream: “Did you lose something on me?”

Cast your mind on Archana, a graceful Indian dancer who, during a study stint in France, was horrified when a classmate blew his nose in class. The Russian man, in turn, found the comely Archana revolting when she issued a sonorous post-meal belch.

It’s so hard to accept our cultural differences. It takes work to see strange habits with anthropological eyes. In my case, anything involving bodily sounds and fluids hits hard. And I spent my days judging, condemning, and criticizing each of these gestures.

And that is exhausting.

Here’s the rub: the strange one around here is me. I’m the uninvited guest who is in no position to criticize the habits and the culture of one billion hosts.

Especially considering that I too, by ignorance or neglect, did things that are here considered rude. Yet I never got a moral lesson from an Indian when, for example, I eat with my left hand – which is reserved for hygienic tasks, never to carry food to the mouth.

No, I got no sermon and no disproving glances. Indians are far too polite to do that.

I now recall, with some amusement, the time I went on an exchange to the U.S. as a 15-year old. I was warned in a printed pamphlet that the habits, nutrition, and climate of a new country can cause a raft of symptoms, like lethargy, irritability, drowsiness, and others. This condition was called “culture shock.”

Uh-huh. The country of Nike, McDonalds, Kleenex, and Madonna. Those savages.