Cultural fluency is not one thing. We tend to picture it as knowing a language, but it runs deeper than that, and it tends to reveal itself in the most ordinary places. I was reminded of this over an unforgettable couple of days with a friend I had not seen in decades.

She owns a highly specialized and regulated company in South America. Just in the last couple of weeks, she took her team to work on deals in North Africa and China. She even had to cut her Texas trip short, because she had to fly to Central America to solve an issue in person.

In between conversations and our reminiscence of the past, asking about friends and talking about some of the professors who impacted us deeply, she fielded dozens of company calls solving issues. I watched her in awe, as if time had opened up a curtain and we had gone from singing Ricky Martin songs out loud in our dorm and dreaming about how we would make an impact in the world, to discussing how the right consultant saved her company millions of dollars in a few months.

Then, I took her to Costco. She could not believe her eyes! Stuff kept piling up in our cart. She was thankful for the extra piece of luggage she brought. This is where it would get filled. She opened up her iPhone and looked through the list of things her friends back home had asked her for. Vitamins and specific types of Tylenol topped the list. For her son? A Nintendo Switch and a giant Lego set. For her? Clothing, lots of clothing! Beautiful skorts for $15?? Unheard of! Not even in China was she able to find such high quality clothing at these prices. Ten dollar branded t-shirts, fifteen dollar dress pants, a twenty dollar dress she wore the very next day, bathing suits with tummy control for less than $20. In her country, any of these pieces would cost $100.

Then my aha moment came. With all this shopping, we had built up an appetite, so we headed to the Costco food court.

She walked directly to order at the counter. I called her over to let her know she needed to order at the station instead. This could have been an insignificant moment, but it wasn’t. It was a moment in which I had to explain to her something that in my world was common knowledge. In that specific moment, that knowledge gave me power. Someone who did not know her background, what she was capable of, and that she does in a week what most people don’t get to do in a lifetime, could have looked at her with an air of superiority and corrected her. Not only was she ordering in the wrong place, but I wonder what they would have thought when they found out that, in English, she has an accent. What box would she fit in, in their mind?

I was immediately transported back to when I was traveling in Peru a few weeks ago. Here, I have a home full of stuff. There, I had only what I could fit in my luggage. Here, I know how to move around in society, how to shop. There, the woman minding the restroom at an archaeological site had to help me decipher my coins so I could give her the right change to use the toilet. Did she feel she had power over me in that moment, because she knew something I did not?

Cultural Fluency Works in Every Direction

Staying within the familiar is easy. Traveling and living outside our cultures is humbling. It takes an open mind, experience, and wisdom to realize what my father used to tell people all the time when he needed to engage in English. “I am completely fluent in my language. Since you don’t know my language and I know yours, we can have this conversation in your language, only if you can keep in mind that is what we are doing.”

Think of your neighbor, friend, or coworker who is from somewhere else. What language or society are they fluent in that you are not?

This is exactly what I explore in InterCulturaling™, in my keynotes, and in my workshops. If this story resonated with you, you can find the book at www.interculturaling.com.