When it comes to peaceful relationships, cultural differences can present real issues.

Strong couples encounter these and work hard to resolve them through careful and compassionate communication.

For couples who don’t? Disagreements and tension are bound to ensue.

And that’s exactly what happened in this story, where a girl’s food choices offended her boyfriend’s family.

But what happened next surprised them all.

Read on to find out how their usually strong relationship was left in disarray.

AITA for mixing food and offending my partner’s family?

I am a 23-year-old Chinese-Australian woman, and I have been dating my boyfriend Andrew (a 26-year-old half Vietnamese, half Australian man) for four years.

I regularly stay at his place on the weekend.

He lives at home with his parents and his older sister Hayley, who is 30.

Let’s see how the family treated their son’s girlfriend.

Not too long ago, Hayley suggested that since I stay over often, I should start paying them for groceries and bills – though I’m still a student so they aren’t too strict with the amount.

I transfer them $50-100 here and there to cover my share.

His family treats me very well and I respect them.

I have been really happy in my relationship so what happened today was quite shocking to me.

Read on to find out how the altercation began.

Andrew’s mother, Louise (60), is Vietnamese and cooks amazing food regularly. I love her cooking!

Today she had cooked a delicious pork rib and taro soup, and I ate some for lunch.

At dinner, Andrew was going to make some instant noodles, so I asked him to make me a pack of Shin Ramen (Korean spicy noodles). When it was done, I decided I wanted some of the pork rib in my noodle, and mix some of the soup in my bowl.

Louise hastily stopped me, saying that no I should not mix the soup with my ramen.

I was confused.

Andrew came over and said the pork rib soup should be eaten alone and not mixed with my spicy noodles, since the flavors are different.

This was when she decided to put her foot down.

I argued that Koreans also eat spicy rib soup, so it shouldn’t be too weird, and since I’ve had the rib soup by itself for lunch, I wanted to try a different flavor.

However, Louise insisted that the way I mix food is wrong, and Andrew said I should just eat my spicy noodles and maybe come back for a bowl of soup later.

The argument got quite heated as I didn’t understand why mixing food is such a crime (this had happened a few times before, when I added different condiments or mixed stir-fry with noodles and Louise pointed out that my eating habits are strange, but she never said more than that).

Then I got overwhelmed and ran to Andrew’s room and started crying.

But the drama didn’t stop there.

Hayley barged in and began yelling at me (she’s normally kind to me, but she does have a bit of a temper). She shouted: “why are you throwing a tantrum in someone else’s house? We are feeding you food and you’re so ungrateful!”

I was really upset because I don’t think I did anything wrong.

In the heat of the moment I stood up and screamed back, “I paid for the food, why should you care how I eat? I’m not forcing you to eat what I eat! If I go to a restaurant and pay for a plate of food, you think they’d kick me out for eating the food wrong? How ridiculous!”

Let’s see what happened in the aftermath.

In the end, I was so angry I packed my bags and stormed out of their house (after Hayley got so mad she said I’m no longer welcome at their house), and now I’m on the way home and crying, wondering what I did wrong.

It really doesn’t make sense!

I tried to put myself in their shoes, and say if Andrew wanted to eat Chinese dumplings with tomato sauce, my Chinese family and I would not care at all (we’d just laugh it off due to personal tastes).

AITA?

Cultural sensitivities are sometimes difficult to navigate, but it’s odd that this usually accepting family became so enflamed by what otherwise seemed like quite a small matter.

But she did nothing to help the matter; rather than trying to understand, she instead blew up and tried to promote her own beliefs.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this.

This person agreed that everyone was to blame for how the situation played out.

While others questioned Hayley’s motives and Andrew’s priorities.

However, this person suggested that she was being disrespectful – for her food choices and her argumentative behavior.

She needs to know that respect goes both ways.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.