It’s cultural

There is one unquestionably good thing when you marry a foreigner, that you got an amazing excuse on your hands:  “It is cultural!” Basically, from now on you can do what you want (or even what you don’t want) and use this wonderful reason.   You can apply “It’s cultural” to anything you do.  You may be loud, quite, shy or bold. You may want to party till 2PM, or like to travel every 2 month, or don’t wait for Friday night to have a night out “It is cultural”.  It simply is. Anything works.  You can dress too bright and smile too flirty, or even be rude, or direct, or too controlling.  It’s cultural.  There are only two dangers here.  First, that you can overuse it and it became less powerful.  Second, that your spouse sooner or later will get this innocent trick and start using it himself. Sometimes it turns to a good direction. I remember my good American girlfriend was going get married, and we spent a good amount of time discussing the size of engagement ring she planned to get.  I didn’t understand that, and I asked her-“Why does it matter”.  “It’s cultural,”- she replied.  Perhaps, women’s weakness for diamonds is not too cultural, but I agree that it became close to obsession in the US.  In Russia we don’t have that tradition.  You grab a guy without thinking too much or too long.  If we would expect from Russian guys to give us a huge diamond ring, half of my country will be still unmarried.  So, when I was going to get married, I told my American fiancée, that I do not need a ring, and I’d rather go to Italy for a week.  He still gave me a ring though, and it almost upset me.  “I told you!” –I looked rather disappointed.  “It’s cultural,”- he replied.   Then, later, after we moved to Russia, he called me on Tuesday evening and informed he met his American friend from college and they are going to have a beer. “On Tuesday night?” – I was surprised.  “Sweetie, it’s cultural!”

I thought to put in this section everything which fit in “It’s cultural”.  And I very hope you can contribute as well and share your stories.