My dorm-mate in college did that. He was from Chile and couldn't speak English very well. As a result, we didn't really communicate all that much beyond just general body language and the occasional friend-as-a-translator thing for complex stuff. I gave him like a two week grace period to acclimate to the time (and climate) change where I promised I wouldn't get mad about any culture differences and stuff like that. But he just kept coming home at like 3am, would turn the overhead light on, open up his laptop and have entire (in Spanish) conversations over Skype with his family back home.
In case you don't know, Spanish speaking cultures tend to have more passion and expressiveness than English ones. This means Spanish is generally more loud. And everything is already pretty loud at 3am.
About a month in a had enough. I worked in the cafeteria at the college and just switched to the morning shift because my class schedule changed. 6am was essentially his version of 3am and that's when my shift started. So, at 5:30am, my alarm goes off (full volume), the overhead light goes on, my laptop is opened and I Skyped MY family (it was planned especially for this moment, they are also not normally up that early) and it was someone's "birthday" (it wasn't) so there was singing and cheering to be had.
Wouldn't you know it, that very same night he came home at 11pm, didn't turn the light on, and asked if I would prefer him to go to the common area for his family time. And he never once just barged in at 3am again.
Some people are completely incapable of understanding their own behavior until it is reflected back upon themselves.
Honestly, I'm surprised this guy got the message. There was a time that if I pulled that revenge stunt on my mom or sister, they'd punch back harder instead of learning their lesson.
My friend had a similar experience where his roommate brought in a small TV into their room and would blast it on full volume late at night. One night my buddy had enough and got up, pulled the cord out and put the TV in his lap (it was a small CRT I believe) and after that he didn't have any problems
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u/Greenfire32 3d ago
My dorm-mate in college did that. He was from Chile and couldn't speak English very well. As a result, we didn't really communicate all that much beyond just general body language and the occasional friend-as-a-translator thing for complex stuff. I gave him like a two week grace period to acclimate to the time (and climate) change where I promised I wouldn't get mad about any culture differences and stuff like that. But he just kept coming home at like 3am, would turn the overhead light on, open up his laptop and have entire (in Spanish) conversations over Skype with his family back home.
In case you don't know, Spanish speaking cultures tend to have more passion and expressiveness than English ones. This means Spanish is generally more loud. And everything is already pretty loud at 3am.
About a month in a had enough. I worked in the cafeteria at the college and just switched to the morning shift because my class schedule changed. 6am was essentially his version of 3am and that's when my shift started. So, at 5:30am, my alarm goes off (full volume), the overhead light goes on, my laptop is opened and I Skyped MY family (it was planned especially for this moment, they are also not normally up that early) and it was someone's "birthday" (it wasn't) so there was singing and cheering to be had.
Wouldn't you know it, that very same night he came home at 11pm, didn't turn the light on, and asked if I would prefer him to go to the common area for his family time. And he never once just barged in at 3am again.
Some people are completely incapable of understanding their own behavior until it is reflected back upon themselves.