This week I had an emotional fallout with a friend I had planned to visit over something as simple as the following:
she wanted me to pay for my own groceries and half of her gas while I was at her house and I thought that was too much to expect of a guest. In fact, I thought it was downright rude. She in turn, thought I expected too much of her as a host. The end result is that we are no longer on speaking terms, but the cause of this altercation was so basic and avoidable had I been in an Aridni mindset when I talked with her: it all boiled down to money.

I was raised in a family where knowing how to be a host was essential to the success of my father’s business. When I was growing up, we regularly had visitors from other countries stay at our house and we wined/dined them, took them to see tourist sites in Boston and did everything possible to make their stay comfortable. Had I not been hospitable towards these guests, it would have hurt our family’s solvency and my father’s reputation. More importantly, as my mother always emphasized, it is important to treat your guests the same way you would want to be treated if you were in their home. It all boiled down to respect. Now, if I am visiting a casual friend, I don’t necessarily expect them to buy me caviar, but I do expect that since I am the one paying for the plane ticket, they will cover some of the other expenses of my visit.

Now, my ex-friend in Virginia has different financial expectations. As she put it, “friends don’t pay for friends… No one owes you anything and if kindness is given, it should be appreciated but not expected.”

I don’t see paying for groceries to be a financial trade- I see it as hospitality, a kindness that is reasonable to expect if you are visiting someone. If I want something special that she doesn’t have, then yes it makes sense for me to buy it myself, but should I have to pay her back for half the spaghetti and meatballs we consumed? What if I get seconds and she doesn’t?

Now, after my friend had explained that she is very poor and sometimes can’t even afford her own food, I completely changed my expectations to accomodate the new information. Our similar, yet contrasting backgrounds could provide a clue as to the discrepancies in our financial expectations of eachother as host and guest. We were both brought up in well-to-do families, but her parents never spent any of their wealth on her–my ex-friend always had to fend for herself. My parents on the other hand, made sure I was never wanting for anything and at the same time, impressed upon me the importance of giving to others who were less fortunate.

The result? My friend thinks that everyone should fend for themselves and I believe in the phrase “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” She says she is too proud to accept “handouts” from people (i.e. a host paying for her groceries) while as a host I would be embarrased to charge my guests for their food. Who’s right?

If the tables were reversed and I was the host, I would most likely not extend an invitation for someone to stay at my house for a week if I did not have the means to be a hospitable host. However, if my budget was really tight and I was close to the person, I might say something like “I really would like for you to visit, but I just want you to know ahead of time that I can’t afford food for two.” That is very different than what my ex-friend said which was “you have to pay for your own food. Every last bit of it.” In fact, as I told her, if she visited me and I was living on my own on a budget, I would pay for her food even if it meant that I had to save up for it because those are the expectations I have of MYSELF as a host. But was it right for me to impose my expectations of myself on her?

The bottom line here is whether it was reasonable for me to place my own financial expectations on my ex-friend and vice versa. Were my expectations of her too high? She certainly thought so; I beg to differ.

What’s really sad is that we were very close friends, but because our financial expectations of eachother were so different, we both percieved eachother as being rude and unreasonable.

My advice: If you are living on a budget, next time you go to the bank, make sure you open a “hospitality” savings account so you can be prepared the next time you have a house guest. Either that or don’t ask for company.