Weird stuff update: Colombian manners

By Oren:

In Colombia, you have to be a bit careful what you do as some things that aren’t rude in England might be rude in Colombia! There are different rules about what is rude or what isn’t.

One of the things that is fine in England but is rude in some parts of Colombia is measuring with your fingers. For example, my teacher Mr Frost really likes fishing and if he caught a really big fish and then showed you how long it was using his fingers you would think it was normal. But in some parts of Colombia the people here would be shocked about how he was measuring things! I don’t know why but doing that means something really rude.IMG_8037 The way to measure things in Colombia is by putting one hand up your arm and the distance between the tips of your fingers and your hand is how long the thing is.

IMG_8041One of the other things that isn’t very rude in England is beckoning with one finger.
It means something rude too but I only discovered you shouldn’t do this here recently.

mannersThe last thing I found out was that if you show how tall someone is with your hand horizontally, that’s rude too. You have to have your hand vertical because you only have your hand horizontally if you’re talking about an animal. So if you do that about a person then they think you’re calling them an animal and they really don’t like it.

There are also things that would be rude in England that aren’t in Colombia. One of the things is that waiters in restaurants clear your plate as soon as you finish your last bite, before anyone else has finished! The other thing that is not very good manners in England is people saying they’ll do something ‘ahorita’ (now) and then not doing it for hours or days, or saying they’ll do something ‘mañana’ (tomorrow) and then not doing it until next week, or never!

The first weird stuff post can be found here.

And in case you don’t already know, we’re now trying to do something amazing and really help children in Colombia. Check out our fundraising page: EverettsInColombiaFundraising