I'm a Dutch expat who's lived here for seven years already. It's my home. For the most part, I'm entirely acclimated and in a few subtle ways I've even become Singaporean in my habits (at least if my friends back home are to be believed).
However, moments ago I just had an enlightening little encounter - a "Singapore moment" - if you will, that reminded me I'm still Dutch:
Myself, a Singaporean colleague, and an unknown Singaporean lady entered the lift on the ground floor of my office. This lift, problematic at times, decided that it was time to jam the doors when they were halfway closed. The doors just sat there, in limbo.
The Singaporean lady did was was intuitive to her: she immediately appealed to the relevant authority (in this case, by calling out to the lobby security guard sat 10 meters away at the reception desk).
I also did what was intuitive to me: I gave the door a firm kick with the side of my foot. This unjammed the door. The lady stood there, somewhat aghast as did the security guard who was already walking towards the lift. He recovered his wits half a moment later to give me a verbal scolding that was still continuing as the doors closed and we continued merrily on our way again.
A trivial incident, but my first reminder in many years I'm a guest in a country with a different culture from my own.
