The literature on simulation-based medical education devotes a wide area to structured debriefing models using specific frameworks and terminology. Yet in a large number of low-resource sites throughout India, effective learning takes place through unstructured contextually relevant styles. This commentary is an experiential account elaborating insights from Basic Life Support (BLS) provider courses at four government medical colleges in Tamil Nadu where context-sensitive and adaptable feedback and debriefing occurs to meet learning needs without being directly guided by structured debrief models. We suggest that debriefing is not best understood in terms of adherence to named debriefing frameworks but rather as a mechanism for enabling deeper levels of reflection, promoting peer-based learning and transferring learning into real world clinical practice through techniques that make sense within educational culture.