Cultural customs are a sign of respect and appreciation, but when two cultures come together, they sometimes clash.

Check out why this woman’s efforts were not appreciated.

AITA for “imposing my culture” even though I thought I was just being nice?

Even though I am American, my parents are immigrants and therefore I have a different cultural upbringing than most. One thing that was hammered into my head from a young age was to always, always bring a small gift when visiting anyone’s house. It doesn’t matter if it’s family or friends or that one person you kind of know but don’t really like, bringing something is a must.

My boyfriend and I have been dating for almost 4 years now and since we both work from home he suggested we make dinner with his parents a weekly thing since we haven’t been able to see each other much for obvious reasons. I love his parents, so obviously I agreed!

But there was a bit of a misunderstanding.

Every week I made sure to bring something small to show my appreciation for them cooking for us (always using my own money); a small bottle of wine, their favorite dessert, some flowers etc. and they always thanked me for it. This has been going on for a few months and absolutely didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary until yesterday when my bf and I were preparing to head over.

I’d gotten a cute vase of daffodils since luckily I’d found some in bloom and my bf’s mom really loves them, but my bf suddenly got really mad and asked why I kept bringing stuff over every week like his parents were “a charity case.”

I got super confused and asked him what the problem was and that I’ve always done this with everyone including his friends since we met. That it was a cultural thing.

Then the misunderstanding got heated.

But then he got even madder and told me to stop imposing my culture on everyone and it’s weird since I’m white.

At that point I didn’t feel like going anywhere with him and just gave him the flowers and went for a walk while he drove over to dinner by himself.

After he came home he still had the flowers which he gave to me and told me he was sorry but his parents really were super annoyed with me constantly bringing stuff over like they can’t take care of themselves.

Later on I got a text from his dad asking me to not come over for dinner anymore. Now my bf’s giving me the cold shoulder unless I give his parents a huge apology, but I really, truly don’t feel like I’m in the wrong for trying to be nice to them. AITA?

Here is what people are saying.

Interesting theory.

Oooh burn!

I’m skeptical.

Maybe. I wouldn’t be surprised.

I agree.

Sounds like she dodged a bullet.

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.