Iced coffee and asking for what you want

We were having lunch in the Hard Rock Café in Penang when I had a light bulb moment about asking for what you want. It all centres around iced coffee. I love iced coffee. As a teenager, at the Polo Club in KL, I used to ask the barman Mr Foo for ‘an iced coffee in a bag,’ as we had to have our drinks in plastic bags tied with a piece of string and a straw poking in, if we wanted to take them out of the clubhouse, to avoid glass breaking and posing a potential danger to horses. There was always sugar in it, and although I haven’t taken sugar in hot coffee since I was 15, I still have to have my iced coffee sweetened.

In the UK, as soon as the weather gets warmer, the first thing I want is curry and the second is iced coffee. Or, if I am thirsty, the other way around! But it’s not always easy to find a proper glass of iced coffee the way I like it. Back in Malaysia this time round, I discovered that most places knew how to make perfect iced coffee and I developed a habit of ordering it if it was on the menu. This time, iced coffee was nowhere to be seen. It was just what I wanted, though.

‘Could you do me an iced coffee please?’
‘Of course, with milk?’
‘Wonderful, yes please.’
‘And sugar?’
‘Yes please.’

Easy. I didn’t know whether I could have it but I asked anyway and my iced coffee was made exactly the way I like it. Now, I know this isn’t a revelation. We all know that we can ask for something that’s not on the menu and sometimes we will still get what we want. I do it quite often. But this was the moment that I noticed how, in Malaysia, I was so much more comfortable than I usually am with asking for what I wanted. I pointed this out to the Teenager. I had already made lots of requests, some of them quite bold. I had insisted that the driver in KL took us where I wanted to go, and not where he wanted to go. I asked for help finding a doctor; I asked for my travel arrangements to be changed. Later, on our way home through KL, I asked for the Business Centre in the hotel to be opened up on a Sunday evening so that I could check us in online. All these requests were met.

I suspect that part of the reason why I felt much more able to ask for what I wanted in the Far East was that I found communication so much more comfortable. This was despite the fact that people sometimes did not understand my English and sometimes I wasn’t able to decipher what people with strong accents were saying to me. But communication in South East Asia tends to be much more gentle and hesitant. The kind of assertiveness that tends to be required in the UK would often look like aggression in Malaysia. And I have never quite achieved that level of assertiveness. As a teenager I learned to ask quietly, even apologetically, and to expect either an eager response or a profuse apology, depending on whether my request could be fulfilled. Such a reserved approach often falls on deaf ears in contemporary Britain, or even invites disrespect. I try to be more demanding but it feels very uncomfortable. In Asia, I feel comfortable asking and I also feel comfortable with the response, whether positive or negative. I don’t feel rejected if the answer is ‘no.’

The communication issues are simply down to cultural differences and must be experienced all the time, especially as so many more people live away from their own country than ever before. Asking for what you want, however, should always feel ok. After all, as I often remind myself, if I am asking, I am posing a question and the person I am asking has a choice; they can say yes or no. Asking is not demanding or insisting and it’s ok to be turned down. It feels a lot better to be turned down gently and politely, though!

It was just an iced coffee, one of many during the fortnight. But that moment meant a lot more. I saw, in Technicolor, how empowering it can be to ask for exactly what you want and to get it. I saw how this can apply to a whole life, not just a drink. And since that moment, I have continued to focus on this question: Am I asking for exactly what I want? Are you?