The question mark would seem all important and **Green Bean **didn’t replicate it.
I think there’s a much brighter and more sensible line in the Western version of what you’re describing though. An apple is cheap (free in your example), easily replaceable, and fungible. Articles of clothing, furniture, beloved toys, are at most one of those things. If someone asked me for a rare orchid, or a lamp, or the shirt I was wearing, or one of my kids toys, I’d consider them rude & a jerk even if they didn’t press the request.
Anaamika, did you ever prime any of your friends to come over and compliment your mother on her lovely dining room set, or television, or something else of hers?
What a great idea! 
Actually, I always wanted her beautiful china cabinet. With some work and a few greased palms that thing could be in MY house now.
And you know, now that I think about it, I do have some of this trait in me. Someone the other day was admiring these bracelets I was wearing. Costume jewelry, but very pretty. Well, I was wearing three and I own six, so I slipped one off and gave it to her. Why not? I had some to spare.
But this belief is entirely cultural. In Southern Cameroon, it is absolutely okay to ask for things you have no expectation of receiving. I can’t tell you how many people stopped me on the street to ask for my shoes. When I said “Uh, then what would I wear” they acknowledge my point and move on. This was totally normal and not a problem, the attitude being “Well, it was worth a shot.”
Understood - I was responding to Princhester’s view that it’s just an extension of generally accepted manners in the West, and that whether or not someone is a jerk depends on how much they push the request. I was saying that even making such a request in Western culture is automatically rude.
Not only that, I left it off on purpose!
Because I truly believe that a Gujarati mafia is victimizing innocent travelers in the southeastern United States. :rolleyes:
Don’t know what weird ass part of Punjab Annamika comes from. I have lived in Northern Punjab region (Potohar specifically Islamabad) for most of my life and I have never never never heard or would have even thought about giving something to someone when the say “they like it”, and nobody I know would either.
And I have spent a lot of time all over the Middle East, never encountered that either.
Seems like a quirk of some people has been presumed to be standard behaviour, something westerners are prone to do about other.s ;).
While I think the phrase “weird-ass” might be a little harsh, I’ve been asking my family and nobody has heard of the practice Anaamika describes. We’re South Indian (Kannadiga and Tamil) so I was wondering if this was one of those Northie-Southie divides, but AK84’s post indicates there’s something else going on here.
FWIW, some of my relatives thought it was a Persian custom, and some thought it would have to be a pro-forma offer (as mentioned already in this thread) and that you wouldn’t be obligated to fulfill it if someone were crazy/rude/unaware as to take you up on it.
One of my family members thought what Anaamika describes might be a form of status-giving: that is, the giver is asserting status or wealth by treating valuable objects as trivial to give away. I certainly know a lot of people, Indians included, who constantly try to assert status in all sorts of ways, so that wouldn’t surprise me. What do you think, Anaamika?
Your criticism is based on the idea that in the cultures in question it is acceptable to (a) flat out ask for a thing of value (b) with any real expectation it would be given. But if you read the responses of the thread from those who have experience of the practice, this is incorrect. Doing so would be regarded as rude. So your point is without foundation.
I think the key is to praise people for their hospitality, rather than for their things. In upper-class Britain it is rude to comment on how nice the furniture is, or even the food. It implies that you did not expect them to have things as nice as they were.
How do you compliment the hospitality without complimenting the food or their things? I am not denying what you are saying (since I haven’t been to Britain and my family is middle class at best), I am just trying to picture what you mean.
Heh, I do have a Muslim friend who tends to be SUPER-Nice about most things in life- if we were in the middle of a rainstorm and I asked for his raincoat, he’s the sort of person who would take it off and give it to you to wear so that you didn’t get wet. I just always chalked it up to being super-nice, and when I visited his family, they’re all like that. Interesting to see that it’s prevalent in other places and not just a his family sorta thing.
I just figured my family is okay as are most people, and he’s just one of the few people that grew up being super-nice and polite about these sorts of things- though if I tried to abuse it, I’m sure he’d call me out on it- though… I can’t definitively say.
Which, to my ear, sounds very much like the tradition of the potlatch among some First Nations peoples of west coast North America (among others).
CMC fnord!
“Lady Astor, how kind of you to have us over for dinner. We had a wonderful time and enjoyed hearing Lord Astor’s views on how the wogs have ruined cricket.”
ETA: of course I am the son a of a lower class Brit who left England 60 years ago, and I have learned most of my facts about British customs from reading Peter Whimsey novels.
And (rather oddly from our modern American point of view) it was traditionally perceived as insulting because it implied that the hosts were responsible for choosing the furniture or the food.
See, the flattering assumption would have been that the furniture was family heirlooms and the food was provided by old family retainers, meaning that the current hosts wouldn’t have much real choice about it. The people unfortunate enough to have furniture and menus that actually reflect their own individual preferences are the nouveau riche. (AKA “the sort of people who buy their silver”.)
I need to make friends with some Arab photographers. I could really use some new lenses.
bolding mine
Funniest damn thing I’ve read all week 
I think we all need to start using “the hammer is my penis” as a shortcut for all this. For example,
“I love that scarf you’re wearing… It suits your complexion… But not mine… I do not want you to give me your scarf.” could be shortened to “I love your scarf, the hammer is my penis”
and “My, you have a lovely lamp… it goes with your home’s decor perfectly… but not mine… I would have no use for it… and I have no way to get it home… please do not offer to carry it home for me… please keep your lamp… I do not want you to give it to me.” is similarly unembiggened into “You have a lovely lamp, the hammer is my penis.”