I enjoyed the WSJ article. The thought of one person trying to be as serious as possible to impress the other who is trying to be as jovial as possible is hilarious.

Sometimes it is hard to tell what could potentially be a cultural gaffe. I’ll never forget the time when I was overseas in Singapore and a group of us Americans were making Pakistani food with a group of Pakistanis for an activity. We were being taught how to make Chapatis which are the Pakistani version of the tortilla. We Americans thought it would be fun to start tossing the dough back and forth to each other like they do in fancy pizzerias. We were laughing and throwing the dough back and forth and the Pakistanis were all becoming very upset. One girl even started crying. Come to find out, bread and dough is considered a sacred thing in Pakistan. Especially in poor areas of the country where most of them were from. Us throwing the dough around as if it meant nothing was sacrilege to them.
We had to do a lot of apologizing and it really put a damper on what should have been a fun activity.