# Can anyone confirm or refute this comment about Arabic culture? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 16, 2010, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664 "2010-03-16T16:11:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/21 "2010-03-17T01:05:06Z")
> [@Drum\_God](#): > > (ETA: This came up because the radio host claimed that an Arabic gentleman serving him coffee at a 7-Eleven complimented him on his shirt. The clerk then went on to request that he (the radio guy) give him the shirt. The caller claimed that this was typical of that culture and not meant to be rude. Is that really typical? I cannot imagine going around wearing my favorite shirt and, when someone compliments my impeccable style, I have to spend the rest of the day shirtless.) This doesn’t really makes sense because in the radio host’s story, the Arab is the _host_ and he is asking a guest to give up his shirt. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/22 "2010-03-17T02:10:52Z")
My, my King Abdullah, those are beautiful oil wells you have there. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/23 "2010-03-17T02:11:56Z")
DocCathode: No, at least not in polite society. But when we go to India, we always bring tons of gifts just because of this. Back in the eighties/nineties electronics were easier and cheaper to get here. If they admire your Walkman, you were supposed to give it to them! So you always brought extra. Now they have everything and more of it. And faster than us. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/24 "2010-03-17T02:12:19Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > This doesn’t really makes sense because in the radio host’s story, the Arab is the _host_ and he is asking a guest to give up his shirt. Well, that’s a good point. How does this hospitality/guest-oriented culture deal with commerce? Obviously, the radio guy liked/wanted/needed some coffee. Shouldn’t the clerk/host have given it to him? However, there are clearly commercial transactions in the Arab world. Are there certain zones, such as stores, where the guest/host relationship is put on hold? Could Exxon executives simply go to the Middle East and say, “We like/need/want all this oil.” and the Arabs simply give it to us? And I’m just now learning of this??? ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/25 "2010-03-17T02:16:01Z")
Does this account for why so many inn-keepers in the US are Arab or Indian? Does their culture lead them to be hosts? How does this translate into staying in a motel also being a financial transaction? I know that motel people refer to customers as “guests”, but they do expect financial compensation while you visit. ---
**Author:** ![Jinx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Jinx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jinx)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/26 "2010-03-17T02:35:02Z")
Yes, it is true. I have heard they are commanded not to look at something too long as they will claim it for their own. But, that is not enough proof for the OP. So, I add I have friends who have been and/or studied these people. They seem to have a fundamental lack of trust in anyone. It is shame, and it explains why it is so hard to get to square one when negotiating with these people. How do they function from day to day in a constant state of paranoia without going insane??? ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/27 "2010-03-17T03:01:08Z")
**Anaamika** , what part of India is your family from? Nobody in my family behaves this way. If I went to someone’s house and they didn’t offer me something to eat, yes, I’d raise an eyebrow, and vice-versa. But nobody in my family or friends just expects me to give away stuff. If a family member were in dire need, I’d be expected to pitch in, if I could, but that’s about it. Plus, you can’t walk five seconds in any major Indian city without someone begging you for something. Does your family really give away stuff to every street beggar who asks you for it? ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/28 "2010-03-17T03:05:28Z")
You people are taking this all way too seriously. It’s not nearly as alien as it sounds. It’s just an aspect of manners taken slightly further than is common in the West. If you had a guest and he looked at your apple tree full of apples and pointedly said: “Gee those apples look great, I could sure imagine myself eating one of those” it would be pretty insensitive and rude to not offer him one, right? But then if the guest said “Gee those rare potted orchids look great, I could sure imagine myself having one of those in my garden” and you didn’t have any to spare and you ignored the implied request or made some comment about how you would love to give him one but you’d been saving them for your aunt and grandmother, and he pushed the request and flat out demanded he get one of your rare orchids, he’d be a jerk, right? So we have exactly the same principle of manners that Arabs do, we just draw a line in a particular (very vague) place as to what is good manners and what is not. Many non-Western cultures just take the same area of manners and draw the line some varying degree further along, is all. Like anywhere, there are people who are obnoxious enough to impose on other people’s good manners (ie jerks) and it sounds to me like the cafe guy was just a jerk. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/29 "2010-03-17T03:06:19Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > Plus, you can’t walk five seconds in any major Indian city without someone begging you for something. Does your family really give away stuff to every street beggar who asks you for it? AFAIK, what with giving to the poor being mandatory in Islam (one of the five pillars of the faith I think), Islamic countries mint very low value coins just for the purpose of alms for beggars. You can give a coin to every beggar you meet and not be down much. The beggars can get enough coins to survive. I assume there’s a similar situation in India. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/30 "2010-03-17T03:15:48Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > AFAIK, what with giving to the poor being mandatory in Islam (one of the five pillars of the faith I think), Islamic countries mint very low value coins just for the purpose of alms for beggars. You can give a coin to every beggar you meet and not be down much. The beggars can get enough coins to survive. > > I assume there’s a similar situation in India. Well, there are low value coins, but I think that’s largely a result of currency devaluation - I don’t think there’s a specific intent to have low value coins for beggars (although perhaps I’m wrong). But we don’t seem to be talking about general charitable giving, which most cultures encourage, but rather giving in response to a demand for or compliment to a specific item. Which is why I’m curious to find out where **Aanamika** is from, because, as I said, her experience is quite different from mine. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/31 "2010-03-17T03:25:57Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > **Anaamika** , what part of India is your family from? Nobody in my family behaves this way. If I went to someone’s house and they didn’t offer me something to eat, yes, I’d raise an eyebrow, and vice-versa. But nobody in my family or friends just expects me to give away stuff. If a family member were in dire need, I’d be expected to pitch in, if I could, but that’s about it. > > Plus, you can’t walk five seconds in any major Indian city without someone begging you for something. Does your family really give away stuff to every street beggar who asks you for it? North India. Punjab, specifically. And of course we don’t give to _beggars_. Only \*guests \*in the house. My mom is crazy anyway. Most people know not to ask for things, and they compliment things in a way that doesn’t make it seem like they need it. However, I have experienced this myself - admire something in a house, and they offer it to you. ---
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/32 "2010-03-17T03:26:12Z")
> [@Drum\_God](#): > > Does this account for why so many inn-keepers in the US are Arab or Indian? Does their culture lead them to be hosts? [Here’s an interesting article from 1999 about the Patel Motel Cartel](http://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/04/magazine/a-patel-motel-cartel.html?pagewanted=1). ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/33 "2010-03-17T03:28:34Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > You people are taking this all way too seriously. It’s not nearly as alien as it sounds. It’s just an aspect of manners taken slightly further than is common in the West. > > If you had a guest and he looked at your apple tree full of apples and pointedly said: “Gee those apples look great, I could sure imagine myself eating one of those” it would be pretty insensitive and rude to not offer him one, right? But then if the guest said “Gee those rare potted orchids look great, I could sure imagine myself having one of those in my garden” and you didn’t have any to spare and you ignored the implied request or made some comment about how you would love to give him one but you’d been saving them for your aunt and grandmother, and he pushed the request and flat out demanded he get one of your rare orchids, he’d be a jerk, right? So we have exactly the same principle of manners that Arabs do, we just draw a line in a particular (very vague) place as to what is good manners and what is not. > > Many non-Western cultures just take the same area of manners and draw the line some varying degree further along, is all. Like anywhere, there are people who are obnoxious enough to impose on other people’s good manners (ie jerks) and it sounds to me like the cafe guy was just a jerk. Very well put. Yes, exactly. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Mondegreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/91b2a8/32.png) [@Lord\_Mondegreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Mondegreen)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/34 "2010-03-17T03:30:15Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > So, is there an accepted manner in which one can convey a compliment on an item without being obliged to abscond with it? I don’t have a factual answer for that, but maybe something like, “that lamp suits your home’s decor perfectly.” Or, “I love that scarf you’re wearing. It suits your complexion,” with either an implied or stated “but not mine” at the end. ---
**Author:** ![Caveat\_lector\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@Caveat\_lector\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caveat_lector_1)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/35 "2010-03-17T03:54:19Z")
A teacher said he ran into something similar while visiting in Korea and would add, “but I would have no use for it, no way to get it home, etc” to statements to keep his hosts from giving or buying him things. ---
**Author:** ![Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilarity_n.suze/32/6223_2.png) [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/36 "2010-03-17T06:00:57Z")
I think it’s true–I’ve heard it about Arab culture. It’s true of other cultures as well. In college I had Iranian suitemates. One of them had lovely bracelets, and when I admired them, she took them off and gave them to me. (There is actually a long story here. They were slip-on bracelets, but fit very tight. My friend’s wrist was not as small as mine, but she could make her hands much smaller. I spent the semester attempting to slide the bracelets off and on as easily as she did, and at the end of the semester I could do it, and tried to give them back. She said no, because now I really deserved them! She also said that in Iran, they were very cheap and no loss to her.) ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/37 "2010-03-17T06:11:23Z")
> [@lieu](#): > > In Kevin Reynold’s film **[The Beast](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beast_(1988_film))** the term _Nanawatai_ is used by a Russian soldier to ask for sanctuary lest he be killed. (From Wiki: ((Pashto: ننواتی, translation sanctuary)) is a tenet of the Pashtunwali code of the Pashtun people. It allows a beleaguered person to enter the house of any other person and make a request of him which cannot be refused, even at the cost of the host’s own life or fortune.) > > Is _Nanawatai_ then the name for what **Drum God** describes? It sounds at the very least like what **Fotheringay-Phipps** mentions. Pashtun aren’t Arabs, though. And Pashtunwali is a really, really intricate code of conduct that doesn’t have a lot of parallels with non-Pashtun moral codes. (From what I understand of it, I’m not an expert.) I haven’t had this experience personally, but from people who have, I understand that while it’s polite to offer to give away your stuff, the complimenter is then expected to refuse it. I’ve heard that just accepting it is considered rude - that everyone knows that the offer is pro forma and not a legitimate offer to give away your prized possessions. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/38 "2010-03-17T06:52:39Z")
> [@Green\_Bean](#): > > [Here’s an interesting article from 1999 about the Patel Motel Cartel](http://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/04/magazine/a-patel-motel-cartel.html?pagewanted=1). Your tag isn’t fair or you are using the term “cartel” loosely at best and slanderously at worst, unless you have information outside of the article to whch you link. The article doesn’t suggest that there is a cartel at all. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/39 "2010-03-17T06:54:36Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > Your tag isn’t fair or you are using the term “cartel” loosely at best and slanderously at worst, unless you have information outside of the article to whch you link. The article doesn’t suggest that there is a cartel at all. Except for the article’s title: “A Patel Motel Cartel?” ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664/40 "2010-03-17T07:01:13Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Except for the article’s title: “A Patel Motel Cartel?” **Pulykamell** provides intel on the Patel Motel Cartel. Swell! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-confirm-or-refute-this-comment-about-arabic-culture/532664.md?page=3)