AITA for calling my wife my wife in public in front of strangers?

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AITA for calling my wife my wife in public in front of strangers?

So I’m American and I live in Hanoi and my wife is Vietnamese. We got married last year and while I still cant speak Vietnamese i do know some basics. Especially knowing vợ is wife and chồng is Husband. When we are out with close friends or family everyone knows were married but most of the time when we would be out together in front of strangers she always just called me bạn (which means friend) I wondered why she wasn’t calling me her husband so I asked her.

She told me it was cause she didn’t want to. Which immediately made me feel like she was embarrassed of me, which in turn made me feel bad about myself. So I started calling her my wife in public as a habit and she kept getting upset when i would do it but wouldn’t tell me why besides she didn’t like it. This went on for about a month or so until she finally told me the real reason she didn’t like it.

Im not sure if im just ignorant of Vietnamese culture but times when strangers especially other men realized i was her husband they would always say (in Vietnamese so i never knew) rude dirty things like how do i compare sexually compared to Vietnamese (aka my size) is she a gold digger for marrying me or why does she feel the need to date outside her race. Once she told me this I’ve felt horrible for bringing this up and told her if i knew I would of said something to them. But she doesn’t want that either because its so taboo to talk bad about elders here even if they’re rude. I don’t agree but i try to understand her point of view. Was i the the a**hole for wishing my wife called me her husband in public?