>>>Thais smile all the time. Means nothing. Most frustrating thing in the world is to try to argue - Western style - with a Thai. they just won't play. But they have raised passive aggressive to an art form almost unknown in the West and communication can be just as blunt - just done differently. Smile - and show the sole of your foot - or approach a table of seated people while standing upright and you'll get the message across faster than shouting across the pub or spitting in somebody's beer would in English.
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>>Showing the sole of your shoe is also bad in arab (moslem?) countries, I understand. Seems stupid to me, how do they buy shoes? Don't they look at them? Now, spitting in someone's beer is a serious offense. Don't do that. (at least with Irish, German, Czech beer - with American it's not as serious a problem as it is not beer anyway).
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>With American beer you could p!ss in it without making any difference! :-) (well maybe it wouldn't be arctic cold anymore)

I remember telling a German friend that unlike most Americans I wasn't a beer drinker. He said "How lucky for you" <g>