Readings For Section 6.1 - Differences in cultures

Today I have been catching up on the readings I need to read for this section.
I started with reading 'Differences in cultures' . It made think about the one and only time I went overseas. Seven years ago, my partner, some of our friends and I went to Thailand for a four week holiday. I brought a Lonely Planet guide and became very aware of most of the cultural differences between their country and ours. For example the fact that it was frowned upon for women to show a lot of skin so when we first arrived, even though it was extremely hot, I was very paranoid of wearing singlets and short, shorts. I soon discovered though, that even though, the Lonely Planet guide told me this, it became clear that it was not strictly true. But one culture difference that did become clear to me was that every time we entered a shop or restaurant we were expected to take our shoes off and leave them at the door. Even if they did have dirt floors!
I think it is a very important thing for people, when they are visiting another country, to take note of the culture and respect it. I also, living in a very tourist orientated town, expect it of people from other cultures, to respect ours when they come here, even if I do give them a bit of leeway because of the culture difference. It is not hard these days, with Internet access etc, to find out about culture differences before going to another country.
At the end of the reading 'Differences in cultures' there was this quick experiment that I gave a go:
Start by reading this:

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS
OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE
EXPERIENCE OF YEARS

Now, quickly count the number of "F"s in that sentence.

On average, anglos find fewer F's than do others. Why?

My first count was three. When I went back I realised that I had missed all the F's in the words OF. Is this what the anglos do? So why do we miss them?