You said: https://www.
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20260506-what-british-people-really-mean-when-they-say-sorry
I'm traveling with a friend to the States, did passport check, in line for entry agent questions. Long line, some Asians break in, everyone outraged. It is so common in Vietnam I was reminded how disliked that is in the States.
Claude responded: I wasn't able to access the BBC article, but I can speak to your situation!
I wasn't able to access the BBC article, but I can speak to your situation!
What you witnessed is a perfect real-world illustration of the cultural contrast the article was likely getting at. In the US, queue-jumping is considered one of the more serious social violations — it signals disrespect for other people's time and the implicit social contract everyone silently agrees to. The outrage you saw is pretty typical. People may not confront line-cutters directly, but the dirty looks, muttering, and seething are very real.
As you noted, in Vietnam (and much of Southeast Asia), queuing norms are simply different — lines are more fluid, and assertively moving forward is often just how things work, not a deliberate slight. It's a collective vs. individual mindset difference as much as anything.
A few things worth keeping in mind for your US entry experience:
At border/CBP lines specifically, cutting is even more fraught because CBP officers can intervene, and fellow travelers are stressed and tired. It's one of the worst places for that kind of friction.
The British "sorry" angle (what your article was likely about) connects nicely here — a Brit in that situation might say "sorry, I think the line is back there" which actually means "you are being incredibly rude and I am furious." Americans tend to either say nothing and seethe, or be much more direct.
Hope the rest of your entry process went smoothly! Are you and your friend heading somewhere specific in the States?
You said: There were no "sorry's" here, several passengers actively pushed them out.
There were no "sorry's" here, several passengers actively pushed them out. Reminds me of trying to buy a ticked for the ferry to Vung Tau. Couldn't get to the counter for this, so a couple of Vietnamese friends formed a wedge for me.
Claude responded: Ha!
Ha! The "human wedge" — a time-honored Vietnamese solution to a fundamentally different queueing philosophy. Your friends knew exactly what game was being played and played it well.
The contrast is pretty stark. At a US Customs line, physical pushing would be genuinely shocking — that's crossing from social violation into something that could get security involved. The other passengers pushing back shows just how seriously Americans take that space. It's almost sacred.
The Vung Tau ferry counter is a perfect example of why. When there's no enforced queue system, the crowd naturally self-organizes around whoever is most assertive. If you play by "polite waiting" rules in that environment, you simply don't get a ticket. Your Vietnamese friends understood that the only way to help you was to adopt the local method — meet force with organized force. The wedge was actually a kind and practical act of friendship.
It's one of those travel moments that teaches you more about cultural norms than any guidebook does. You can read that Vietnam has different queuing culture, but standing helplessly at that ferry counter while the crowd surges is when you feel it — and suddenly the behavior makes complete sense within its own logic.
Did the line-cutters at Customs actually get away with it, or did the pushing passengers successfully eject them back to the rear?
You said: I think I would read it as the intruders realized something was wrong and gave in.
I think I would read it as the intruders realized something was wrong and gave in. Crossing a heavily trafficked street in Vietnam, even in a zebra crossing, is similar. You walk straight forward. Oncoming traffic judges your momentum and adjusts. Don't change speed or stop, therein lies disaster.
Claude responded: That's a perfect analogy — and it reveals something deep about how different societies negotiate shared space.
That's a perfect analogy — and it reveals something deep about how different societies negotiate shared space.
In Vietnam, crossing the street is a continuous negotiation in real time. Everyone is reading everyone else's momentum, and the system works because people commit. The danger isn't the traffic — it's the unpredictable pedestrian who freezes or lurches. The drivers can't model you anymore.
The ferry counter and the queue-jumping work the same way. Space is negotiated dynamically, and hesitation or passivity gets you nowhere — literally.
In the US (and much of the West), shared space works on pre-agreed rules — the queue, the crosswalk signal, the right of way. Everyone agrees to the abstraction, and violations are moral offenses, not just tactical losses. That's why the reaction was so visceral at Customs. It wasn't just inconvenient — it felt wrong, almost like cheating.
What's interesting about your Customs story is that the intruders essentially walked into a Vietnamese-style dynamic negotiation and found themselves in an American rule-based system instead. When they felt real physical resistance and social hostility, they recalibrated — they read the "momentum" of the crowd and yielded. So in a sense, the American passengers did respond in a slightly Vietnamese way — not with appeals to rules, but with force — and it worked.
Your Vietnamese street-crossing experience probably makes you a calmer traveler in chaotic environments than most Westerners ever become.
You said: Actually my age buys me a lot more space.
Actually my age buys me a lot more space.
Claude responded: Ha!
Ha! The universal algorithm — everyone's traffic model includes age as a variable. A older pedestrian stepping off the curb gets a noticeably wider berth than a young local.
It probably works at ferry counters too. Hard to aggressively elbow past someone's grandfather.
You said: One time me and several other Westerners were trying to get back to our hotel and HCMC won a soccer match against Singapore.
One time me and several other Westerners were trying to get back to our hotel and HCMC won a soccer match against Singapore. Now that's unheard of and the city went crazy. It took a couple hours to get to the hotel.
Claude responded: That must have been something else entirely — HCMC beating Singapore would have felt like a moon landing to local fans.
That must have been something else entirely — HCMC beating Singapore would have felt like a moon landing to local fans. Vietnamese football passion is already intense on a normal match day, but an upset like that turns the streets into one giant, continuous celebration.
The motorbike horn symphony alone must have been deafening. And unlike a Western sports celebration which tends to flow toward bars and stadiums, Vietnamese victory celebrations just spill everywhere — flags, horns, people hanging off bikes, the whole city becoming the venue.
For a group of Westerners just trying to find their hotel it was probably equal parts exhausting, disorienting, and — in retrospect — an absolutely unforgettable thing to have been caught inside of. The kind of night you can't engineer as a tourist, it just happens to you.
Did you eventually find a way through, or was it mostly just slowly being carried along by the general current of the crowd?
You said: I might describe it as finding our way through by picking appropriate currents to go with.
I might describe it as finding our way through by picking appropriate currents to go with.
Claude responded: That's beautifully put — and it loops right back to the street-crossing philosophy.
That's beautifully put — and it loops right back to the street-crossing philosophy. You'd already internalized the Vietnamese way of reading and committing to momentum. Don't fight the flow, find the current going your direction and join it.
A Westerner fresh off the plane might have stood there panicking, looking for a gap that never comes. You'd already learned that you work with the energy of the crowd, not against it.
Probably also helped that a group of visibly confused, tired foreigners trying to get home wasn't exactly threatening to the celebrating crowd — you were more curiosity than obstacle. The mood was generous.
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