culture shock

In the beginning of the week each table learned a card game. Then when players from different tables moved around we realized each table had a different set of rules, like some tables the ace was high, and some tables the ace was low. Each table had essentially become their own culture, and each table had a different set of rules to play the game by, which is like how different cultures have different rules to live by. When I stayed with a French family in France for two weeks, I experienced a lot of culture shock. It was hard to get accustomed to certain things. One night my French family ordered pizza for dinner, and I thought yes, finally something I have had experience eating before. Except that when we all sat down and started eating the pizza I realized I was the only one eating the pizza with my hands and everyone else at the table was cutting up the pizza with a fork and knife. I felt like I had no table manners, and I felt so rude and embarrassed. I put down the pizza and started to eat it with a knife and fork, and I apologized. I said in America, Americans eat pizza with their hands. My french family was understanding because they are aware there are different rules for every culture, and they didn't mind me eating the way I was raised to eat pizza. So, what I learned from eating pizza was that every culture has different rules, customs, norms, and sometimes you don't understand them but you have to have cultural relativism and just be aware that people do things differently. One way isn't better than the other, they're just different.