Swedish Exchange Student Celebrates Her Birthday With A Special Tune, But The Host Mother Is Horribly Offended By The Lyrics
by Benjamin Cottrell
Navigating the complexities of family dynamics can be challenging enough, especially when you mix in cultural differences.
When this family welcomed a foreign exchange student into their home, tensions rose over a seemingly innocent Swedish birthday song.
An unsuspecting husband is left caught between his wife’s sensitivities and the student’s innocent intentions.
Read on for all the details.
AITA for not supporting at my wife when she started to cry at a Swedish tradition?
I (52 m) and my wife (47 f) already have three kids (13m, 13f and 20 f), but a few months back we felt like we could use a breath of fresh air, so we signed up to take a foreign exchange student for a year.
We got a 16 year old Swedish girl that I will call Sara and that has worked very well.
She’s very open and honest and loves to share how things are in Sweden how different things are here in the US.
Those differences were particularly evident on her birthday.
It was her birthday just a few days ago so we gathered around the laptop while she was face-timing her family and they started singing in Swedish, but the song was particularly longer and more repetitive.
After the call, I asked her about it and she explained that some families in Sweden sing a song where they talk about harming the birthday person after they turn 100.
His wife wasn’t too pleased with this,
My wife overheard this and started to get annoyed because in her words, “It was inappropriate and extremely disrespectful to her household” when she sang that without her knowing.
It turns out, this is a topic she’s sensitive about.
My wife isn’t naturally sensitive to bad language or words, but when she was born she had a 60 year old dad that died when he was 96.
So she is more conscious about how elderly people can feel just before they are about to die and she felt like the song was making fun of people when they are old and sick.
Tension then filled the air. The wife wouldn’t let up.
Me and the twins were embarrassed while standing there, so I asked her to calm down and that it’s just a Swedish joke song that isn’t even meant in that way.
But she just started ranting about it was her house to and she shouldn’t be afflicted to such derogatory language behind her back.
Sarah tried to diffuse the tension, to no avail.
Sarah obviously felt bad and tried to apologize and that she didn’t mean to be disrespectful in that way and that it was just her family singing the song.
But my wife just stormed out and yelled how she couldn’t believe we had taken in a girl from such a cruel family.
He tries to calm her down, but her anger only intensifies.
I tried to talk to her in our room right after I assured Sara that she didn’t do anything wrong and to just pay no mind.
My wife was apparently more upset at me for not supporting and agreeing with her and started to cry about how I knew what she had gone through concerning her father but didn’t back her up.
After her outburst, things weren’t quite the same around the house.
The house has been extremely tense especially when all of us are in the same room. But I really don’t understand how a Swedish song could make her so upset.
I’m wondering if I should have taken my wife’s side and been more sympathetic.
AITA???
That’s one way to put a damper on a birthday celebration.
What did Reddit think?
Being a good foreign exchange student hosts requires not only a healthy physical space, but an emotional one too.
Perhaps the wife took the lyrics of the song a little too literally.
It wasn’t right for the wife to put the student in such an uncomfortable position.
Maybe the wife bit off a little more than she could chew with this exchange student.
It’s clear that cultural differences don’t always mesh as well as hoped.
Even the sweetest melodies can sometimes hit a sour note.
If you thought that was an interesting story, check this one out about a man who created a points system for his inheritance, and a family friend ends up getting almost all of it.
Categories: STORIES
Tags: · aita, birthday, birthday traditions, foreign exchange, foreign exchange student, picture, reddit, sweden, swedish, top, weird
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