On about my third day working at the hotel, one of the hotel staff invited me to dinner that night to meet her family, which is in fact customary in Chinese culture. Not weird, I promise. Just a polite and welcoming offer, and so I accepted. When work was done, she led me up the road to her house, where her family was waiting with dinner. I was greeted (and at the time slightly overwhelmed) by more than 20 family members, all waiting to shake my hand and say hello. Mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, the whole family. I met them all. We sat down around a stone table where eating commenced around a traditional fish dish.

In China, prepared fish still have bones. Lots of bones. Family members were all talking amongst themselves, but I noticed that they were spitting out the bones to the fish onto the table, and quite forcibly. I think I just sat there for a while, stunned, because soon enough, all 40 eyeballs were looking at me. This was a test.

And it was time to fit in.

I took a big piece of fish, organized the bones in my mouth, and spit them out onto the table. All of the family members laughed and smiled, and we went about eating our dinner. The American wasn’t so bad, after all.

As poor as my dinner etiquette was that night, the reality of the situation was that I had entered a completely new culture, and it was my job to shift myself into their way of life. That’s just how travelling and culture works – as I moved through the next couple of weeks in the village I kept learning these pieces of local culture, such as spitting out the bones of the fish, and I became more accepted in the community as I did so. Some of the best times I had while in China were when I felt like I truly fit in.

Poor table manners aside, the fish that night was the finest I ever had.