@lillycoyote – Many people who leave their country for the very first time realize stuff about their own country which they have never noticed before or simply took for granted. Knowledge about ones own culture is very complex. It’s not about hamburgers or going fishing.
Cultural dimensions is one model to understand differences, see for example
http://www.geert-hofstede.com/geert_hofstede_resources.shtml
One indicator is called Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) which deals with a society’s tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity; it ultimately refers to man’s search for Truth. It indicates to what extent a culture programs its members to feel either uncomfortable or comfortable in unstructured situations. Unstructured situations are novel, unknown, surprising, different from usual. Uncertainty avoiding cultures try to minimize the possibility of such situations by strict laws and rules, safety and security measures, and on the philosophical and religious level by a belief in absolute Truth; ‘there can only be one Truth and we have it’. People in uncertainty avoiding countries are also more emotional, and motivated by inner nervous energy. The opposite type, uncertainty accepting cultures, are more tolerant of opinions different from what they are used to; they try to have as few rules as possible, and on the philosophical and religious level they are relativist and allow many currents to flow side by side. People within these cultures are more phlegmatic and contemplative, and not expected by their environment to express emotions.
Many cross-country projects or even acquisitions and mergers fail because corporate managers don’t understand the culture of their own country and think it’s enough to learn about the food of the foreign country.