It's lunch time, you are at a food court, your usual group of colleagues decided to order mala fragrant hotpot together. You wanted to save money so you told them you just wanna have cai png instead.

Eat what you want. As you mature, you know what you want for yourself. No one else is going to pay for your bills you know.

Set your boundaries, or just ask them to treat

For me, I hardly eat MXLG. It is just hot & spicy YTF to me :P sorry all, don't hate me

I have a friend who also faced this issue previously. In the end, she stopped going out with that group of colleagues and had lunch by herself. Her group (super high-class) wanted to go to restaurants most of the time 😂

I guess you must be quite young and it's natural to want to be part of a group. However, you shouldn't feel pressured to join them. Well, even if you don't have lunch with them, work is still work - they will have to fulfill their side of the contract.