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When lunch time hits at our close office space, a majority of my coworkers tend to very loudly enjoy their meal. The amount of slurping and chewing noises is amazing. All these noises with the saliva, open mouth chewing, crunching, slurping (we are all in a close office space) annoy the hell out of my non-slurping coworkers and me.

How can I respectfully address this issue?

Lilienthal
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user2924127
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    I've cut the ethnic component from your question entirely as it is simply not relevant in my opinion and gives your post a very hostile tone. I agree with enderland closing this as a duplicate as the linked question covers a sufficiently similar situation, but I can see an argument being made for this being reopened to consider the problem when a majority of the office shares the behaviour. – Lilienthal Apr 13 '16 at 19:26
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    The ethnicity is very important. This kind of behavior is accepted in their culture which makes the situation difficult. Due to their culture they do not know any better. – user2924127 Apr 13 '16 at 19:29
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    @user2924127 the majority of chinese who come to america only interact with other chinese people. a very insular community. you see it all the time at university and it is much worse outside of university as well. –  Apr 13 '16 at 20:04
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    If it bothered me, I would likely just leave the office for lunch so I didn't have to hear it. You would have a very difficult time changing behavior learned as a child and deeply ingrained. I am sure there are things Westerners do that are equally distracting to them. – HLGEM Apr 13 '16 at 21:11
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    It's not a duplicate, even less exact. The cultural background is 100% key here, while it's completely absent from the other question. However I find it strange as in my experience as a Westerner in the West, Chinese people are extremely considerate and respectful of other cultures - especially the one of the country they moved to - and whenever I shared a meal with a Chinese friend or colleague - which is all the time - slurping and such has never been an issue because Chinese automatically refrain from that in such cases. It's very wrong to think that they don't know any better. – SantiBailors Nov 11 '16 at 13:22

1 Answers1

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You could tape up an anonymous note by the microwave:

"Dear friends. In American culture, slurping your food while eating is considered a rude behavior. Please be considerate of your neighbors while in the office. Thanks!"

Xavier J
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