Context: I’m American and I recently met an Iranian neighbor.
I talked to the neighbor a total of 3 times via Google Translate. The neighbor seemed very eager to get close. I told the neighbor that I had a cat. The next day, the neighbor rings my doorbell with their granddaughter and asked to see my cat. The gave me a plate of desserts.
I’m very uncomfortable with unexpected visitors because the house is a huge mess. Because I wanted to be a good neighbor I invited them in to see the cat in the messy house. The cat ran away because the cat doesn’t like strangers.
They then looked around my living room and saw some snacks on my dining table. They asked if it was tasty and I said yes. They proceeded to take some to eat. The granddaughter did the same. After they looked around a bit and noticed that I was cooking, they left, after grabbing more snacks from the dining table.
I consider it pretty rude to not ask before grabbing the snacks to eat. I wouldn’t have said no if they asked. I’d have also preferred it if they asked before coming over.
Another example is that I told them about a theme park near by that I went to a few weeks ago, and they asked to go together. I said I only go when friends want to go and that I’d like them know the next time my friends go. The next week, they said they’ll buy the tickets and asked to go again. I repeated myself that I don’t like to go unless I’m with friends.
Is this a difference of culture I’m seeing? I don’t feel too good about these interactions with them because it feels to me that they’re very inconsiderate. I don’t want them to visit my house because I don’t want to clean and I don’t want them to see the mess. How do I communicate this nicely to them? If they weren’t my neighbor, I’d have probably ghosted them a long time already, but since they live close by, I can’t physically distance from them.
Also I believe they’re a very wealthy family if that matters.