Small lies like that are a huge part of everyday communications. No one should feel overly guilty about them and we need to be able to make them. They can be a kind of courtesy.
Knowing this, the trick was either to not take specific times seriously or to give a fake meeting time (earlier than the actual one) so the person gets there on time.
If he had no set time to meet, he'd say he would be there around "native o' clock" which meant he would be there at the time +/- 30-45 minutes. If we agreed to a specific time, he would be there on time. It really helped me and I learned a lot about how Native American culture operated while we were roommates.
And I hold everyone to it. If you don't show up in the amount of time you specify I'm gone.
I'm Romanian too I just hate wasting my time. My friends learned that really quickly.
If I'd taken a 30 minute train ride to come and see you, been delayed by 10 minutes, then find you're gone when I arrive I don't think our friendship would last very long.
But people in NYC know that the late party might not have cell phone coverage. Conventions adapt, life goes on.
Respect.
I always underestimate how long it will take,this does not mean I am lying, it means I am bad at guessing how long it takes me to walk/drive/sit in a train somewhere
The negative consequences fall on the person receiving the lie. It's not a courtesy. It has long-term consequences to your credibility and trustworthiness.
It is far better to tell the truth in this case.
However, this creates problem for people who actually show up on the given time. Now you have guests in the house to entertain while at the same time make preparations for the party. It also embarrassing for guest to arrive on time only to find out that they are early.
Sometimes when we really want to convey be timeliness, we say something like 5PM American Time not Desi Time. But I really wish we don't have to do this.
When we want people to be on time and don't want to assume that they will be late, we usually say a little more or give a reason (like we made reservations etc).