I'm a British guy living in Warsaw, Poland. This has generally been very positive for my dating life and personal evolution. But I assumed that in dating everywhere, no one was exclusive until they had "the talk" about exclusivity. This summer I dated a couple of girls and one of them broke down in tears when she found out I had been meeting other girls.

I asked some Polish friends about the situation and some said :

"what? are you crazy? how can you give anyone a fair chance if you're dating other people at the same time?"

Some said: "yeah, I can see why she got upset. I used to be like that."

And some (the ones who travelled more) said: "no, you didn't promise her anything you can do whatever you like"

I'm really wondering how to apply plate theory and avoid having "the talk" prematurely to diffuse cultural expectations. I tried to do this subtlety with the girl who lost it to prevent it happening "I'm not promising anything" somehow equaled "he's exclusive to me" in her mind, and she had travelled a lot outside of Poland, too. So that clearly didn't work. It seems that Poland is trapped between 21st century sexual marketplace thinking combined with you-have-a-choice-of-2-people-in-the-village-to-marry.

Any advice how I should apply plate theory here?