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In middle eastern culture it is considered rude to shake or eat with your left hand. You should always shake and eat with your right hand. Besides this because of religious reasons men and women do not shake hands so when I came to England felt that I was being rude when I rejected to shake.

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I have lived in England my whole life. I am located in the town of Brentwood which is in the county of Essex. The most noticeable features of my culture would be the way I speak and some of the language I use. Many phrases or words I use aren’t interpreted correctly. There is also an identity that comes with being from Essex that is viewed a certain way from outsiders especially from other areas of England.

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My cultural experience is the learning of the different values and traits gained from both my parents as they come from different countries. Wales and Ireland respectively. Although I classify myself as English due to having been an nd raised there and being 25% English, I have still learned and adopted values from my parents cultures respectively that are used in British society too so it’s beneficial. I don’t regularly visit those countries but knowing I can understand their cultures and values is beneficial for me and to my parents.

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Having come from a country with so many diverse cultures, I have learnt certain aspects of each one. A friendly handshake shared amongst the local Shona people shows respect and loyalty to their culture. Eating red dirt is common amongst the rural people, as they believe it contains many nutrients that they cannot get from any other source. Dancing and dressing up in traditional clothes made from animal skins and local fabrics is different in each culture.

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People in Cyprus are Muslims and due to our religious and god beliefs we are not permitted to eat pork. However, there is not any strict rule about it some people are eating pork. Cyprus is a very small island so everyone is close each other and even they dont know each other they treat politely to each other. Due to being a small island people can easily make prejudgement about other people’s physical beauty or attitudes so we feel a pressure in the community because of that kind of people. Cyprus is very touristic country and due to its Mediterranean climate it is one of the favourite place for tourists. People are also friendly towards strangers as well.

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Since childhood I’ve been travel a lot and I thought there won’t anything that could impress me much. However, when I visited Thailand I was amazed with the local traditions and cuisine. I still can’t understand how is it possible to cook and eat insects, but I could say, that I will remember this for the rest of my life. People in Asia and their culture and traditions are completely different and that is why I really like them.

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I am from Kolkata, India. My cultural identity is Bengali. The main structural culture in India is the role of religion. My parents are Hindu so, they go to the temple once a month to pray. In the Hindu religion it is illegal to eat beef and pork. The main social culture of India is respect for age. It is engrained in the culture that you should respect your parents.

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I am originally from Azerbaijan, due to my family business I lived in multiple post-Soviet countries and this gave me a enormous chance to observe and absorb different characteristics from different cultures. Due to these circumstances of observation, I can connect with multiple nations mentality, culturally and linguistically. As I have studied in a International Boarding School in Switzerland, I have broadened my network of friends and had a great opportunity to adopt Swiss cultures punctuality, disclipline and also gained the capability of being able to live alone and taking care of myself by doing my own laundry, cooking my own food and traveling alone. I believe by starting to study in UK I will broaden my network of friends even greater and observe and adopt characteristics of English culture which fits my personality and characteristic.

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My culture is somewhat mixed and matched, I am half British and half Dutch however have loved and grown up in Tanzania my whole life. From the age of three I went to a French school which was later followed by boarding school in SouthAfrica. From this I can say I have adapted to different cultures however asking for my own culture I would find difficult to explain. Explaining my culture I would say I follow the normal English culture however with my own personal African twist.

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Being born with two ethnic backgrounds I never really knew if I was English or French. I grew up in France and people used to say that I was more English than French. However in England my friends say I am more French than English. Furthermore, when I was young I struggled to know which one I was because I was always the  foreign guy. But now I feel that both cultures have made who I am today and I think that it helped me to understand other cultures. However, I feel more French than English.

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Being an Indian, born and brought up in the Middle East ,  I have learnt a lot about the 2 cultures. For Hindu Indians it is against their culture to eat beef as it is considered their god. A beef ban was placed in a few places in India and anyone who was caught eating beef could spend about 5 years in Prison.

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I came to boarding school in the UK when I was 16. This was the first time I lived in a country other than Sudan. There were many different nationalities living in the boarding house. I found that the students from ex - soviet states were the ones who were closest to my culture, being the only Arab student living there. It was easier for me to socialise with them than with students from other cultures.

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I don't identify myself with apolish culture. Fact where I am from is ambivalent to me. I spent more than a month living with Belarusian family, than Algerian family. I spent a lot of time living in Sweden with my grandparents. This and many others experiences helped me create my own definition and feelings towards my culture identity. I think that following just one culture makes people close minded and does not help to understand people from another parts of the world.

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My first cultural experience was when I was around the age of 10 when I had my first pen pal. She was a girl from the south of France and her parents were friends of my parents. This was my first real introduction into the life of someone from a different culture to my own. She told me about the different education system and how our daily lives were different. As I was fairly young I found it difficult to understand how so many things could be different to the way I live. 8 years later and i now have a wider understanding of several different cultures but still find the differences fascinating.

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As a child, I have always been surrounded by many different cultures. When I moved to another part of London, I was shocked and confused with the lack of different cultures around me. I don't see myself as specifically English, instead a mixture of both French and English identities. This is due to the fact that part of my family comes from France, therefore aspects of both cultures combine to create the one I am familiar with.

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My cultural identity

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Growing up in London, I was always accustomed to different cultures and ethnicity, mainly due to going to a school with 78 different nationalities. However, a memory that particularly sticks out in my mind is going to my Indian friends for dinner one night. What surprised me the most was the amount of food that was served on the table. The whole experience was very social, with most of his family attending the dinner along with other family friends of theirs. I remember asking if it was a special occasion, to which his mother informed me that it was a standard dinner time for them and they hosted meals like this all the time. It was somewhat chaotic with the amount of different Indian foods being practically chucked all over the table.

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One of the first memories i have of a different culture is when i was visiting my grandma in England. I used to watch a lot of TV as a child and there was a big difference in children TV programs. The pace was a lot slower and more emotional. Also British comedy is very different from what we conceder funny in my home country.

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Since i was raised in a third world country such as Kosovo, i was not used to different kind of cultures and beliefs. One of my first memories is when i was 5 and my sisters friend from Bangladesh came to our house to stay over, it was hard for me to understand why she can't speak our language. Nevertheless, i remember thinking that she might be an alien, the idea came to me from all of the cartoons i have been watching. I truly believed that my mom and sister were not understanding me, and they did not believe that she is an alien.

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When I was about 6 years old, I had just moved to Spain with my brother and mother. The biggest recollection I have of that time, was the first day of school. As my mother drove us to school, she gave us some fun facts about the English language as it was completely alien to both my brother and I. She told us what the English word for banana was and that had us in tears for the rest of the ride ! Furthermore, upon spending more and more time between Spanish people, it came as a shock to me that Spanish people were very private. Coming from a Moroccan community in Holland, it was always normal for me to see people sharing food, toys, even money. However, in this alien community, it was normal for a person to open a bag of crisps and eat it infront of me without even offering to share. This was a big culture shock for me !

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When I was 12 years old, I went on a school trip to Australia. My homestay prepared sandwich for me to have for lunch but in China we have proper meals for Breakfast, Lunch and Supper. I spent a long time to get used to have only one main meal a day.

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My first awareness of other cultures was when I was about 9 or 10 and the daughter of my parents' friends from Germany came to stay with us. She brought black bread with her. I had never seen nor heard of such a thing- only white or brown.  She didn't shave her underarms and this shocked me.
A year later I went on a school trip to Switzerland and felt very sick on the coach. A Swiss lady thrust a bottle of 4711 eau de cologne under my nose.  I had never seen nor smelt it before and it seemed so exotic! It also helped me to stop feeling sick.
I guess the point of these vignettes is that our encounters with other cultures often involve all our senses and create strong emotions.