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Post by spaceflower on Apr 5, 2014 14:00:46 GMT
My daughter complains. When she travels by air, she wanst to read a book, work on her computer or sleep (she never gets enough sleep). But what to do with a chatty neighbour (is his hard-to-spell word even the right word for the person sitting next to you) who does not seem to understand hints.
The trip starts with the steward telling her someone wants to change places. But she has a lot of luggage (computer, cameras etc) with her. She looks at the man beside her. "So it is a friend of yours?" "Ehmm, I suppose so". Does not sound like a very close friend, she thinks and tells the steward she does not want to change places.
She opens her book. The man sees that it is in German and bursts out "Du sprichst also Deutsch?" (Question to German-speaking: Shouldn't he say "Sie sprechen also Deutsch?") He had obviously studied German but spoke with a strong accent so she did not understand him at first. So they chatted away in German for 20 minutes. Then she started to read her book. But he continued to talk. This is the time she wanted to say "Shut up and leave me alone". But my daughter is brought up to be polite. So she closed her eyes. "Are you tired? Can I borrow your book?" Yes, he can (since he does not leave me in peace to read it myself, she thinks). Her feigned sleep turns into real sleep.
Suddenly she is awaken by a shrill woman's voice. "Why does she not want to change places? I'm sitting beside a big man who has broken his leg and I can hardly move! And so far away from you!" ("My God, this must be his colleage, can't she live without his company for the rest of the trip, it is only half an hour left!") "Do you two want me to change places", my daughter asks. "No, no, it is not neccessary", the man says. Then he starts to talk to her in German again. "I don't understand anything", the woman says and goes back to her seat. "This is my girl friend, it is rather new", the man said. ("No wonder she wanted to sit beside him, but why did he not say so in the first place! I wish I had changed places at the beginning!")
The food is served. The man says he is on a diet and only wants the fruit. My daughter was starving and ate everything. He observed and when she was finished he said "Was it enough for you?" ("For ... sake, leave me and my eating alone!")
Unwelcome conversations happen every time she travels. How can she make people understand that she is not interested in long conversations, without being impolite?
I think the best (only?) way is to feign sleep like she did, but then you can't do what you planned. My daughter travels a lot, but I never go anywhere nowadays. It may be different in different cultures too. Where she lives now, people are not afraid to point out that she is too fat. (She is not fat by Swedish standards.) Or that is high time that she gets married.
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Post by tangent on Apr 5, 2014 14:27:55 GMT
Maybe she could wear make-up to make herself look like an old woman. Or perhaps wear a Jehovah's Witness badge. Has she tried answering someone in a made-up language and pretending she is foreign?
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Post by Kye on Apr 5, 2014 14:58:12 GMT
I don't understand the old woman remark...
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Post by Mari on Apr 5, 2014 16:43:41 GMT
The easiest way is to not make eye-contact at all and immediately put in earthingies to listen to music whilst doing something else (sleeping/working/etc). Everytime someone tries to engage in conversation anyway, say "sorry, what did you say?" whilst taking out the earthingy only a little bit, indicating you want to get right back to your music. Works in the bus and trains.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2014 17:35:52 GMT
I generally do what Mari suggested and then stare out of the window so people won't even get the idea to talk to me. It usually works. But I think I also got used to having a facial expression that says "Leave me alone!", at least so people have told me, that I often look like I don't want to talk to anyone. Admittedly, I found that difficult when I was working in the bar. I wasn't obliged to have conversations with people there, but especially men frequently tried to engage me in a conversation. Often, I would then get busy cleaning something, putting together a playlist on the laptop or staring at my phone and doing something (even if it was just deleting old e-mails or looking at forums). Sometimes, very short replies wor as well. After having answered a few questions with just yes, no or hm, I was sometimes asked if I didn't want to talk and would then just say that I didn't really have anything to say about the topic they were trying to talk about. Admittedly, it's a difficult situation and I also struggle to just tell people I want to be left alone. Maybe it would be okay for your daughter to just say politely "Excuse me, I have to work and can't really talk."
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Post by Moose on Apr 5, 2014 17:45:37 GMT
I am really bad at getting rid of people who I don't want to talk to but who don't seem to realise it . I tend to stand or sit and inwardly whimper but at the same time keep nodding and smiling. When the crazy lady who lived up the road kept dropping round all the time I actually stopped sitting outside, even on sunny days, just to avoid her
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Post by Alvamiga on Apr 5, 2014 18:21:13 GMT
I talk to people. That usually puts them off!
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2014 6:16:56 GMT
I am really bad at getting rid of people who I don't want to talk to but who don't seem to realise it . I tend to stand or sit and inwardly whimper but at the same time keep nodding and smiling. When the crazy lady who lived up the road kept dropping round all the time I actually stopped sitting outside, even on sunny days, just to avoid her I might have done the same. With our old crazy neighbour it was a bit difficult for me as well and I just completely ignored her so she wouldn't talk to me.
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Post by spaceflower on Apr 6, 2014 12:12:31 GMT
Maybe she could wear make-up to make herself look like an old woman. Or perhaps wear a Jehovah's Witness badge. Has she tried answering someone in a made-up language and pretending she is foreign? Haha, I don't think she knows how to make herself look like an old woman. Anyway, when she arrives she does not want to look like an old woman. And she IS foreign, she lives abroad. If she reads a book in English, people know she understands English. If she reads a German book as in this case, of course the man beside had studied German. If she would read a Swedish book, people would probably ask her "what language is this?" Earlier she had the problem that so many young men wanted to be her friend. She was not romantically interested. They were nice but she did not really have time for more friends. So how do you let them down gently? The problem seems to arise abroad, not in Sweden. Swedish people are often not interested in small talk. I know that I'm not. She is, unlike me, good at keeping a conversation going, but says it takes too much time and energy. Her next trip will be to the USA. It's her first time. (I've never been there.) Flight trips takes several hours so it is hard to avoid conversations.
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Post by tangent on Apr 6, 2014 17:08:26 GMT
OK, here's another suggestion. She could carry a card with her bearing the message, "sorry, I have a throat infection and it's painful for me to speak."
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Post by jayme on Apr 6, 2014 18:02:49 GMT
Or, rather than resorting to subterfuge, just say, "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude, but I really would like to read my book."
Anyone who needs constant distraction enough to be unable to sit still and not bother strangers should have brought their own book or something with them, anyway. You cannot live your life in such a way as to expect strangers to entertain or babysit you.
The story with the idiots who wanted her to change seats is ridiculous, anyway. If it was so important to them to sit together, they should have considered that when they purchased their tickets. If they purchased them too late to get seats together, they needed to put on their big girl/boy panties and deal with it. It is only a few hours! It is not your daughter's responsibility, as a fellow passenger, to have to babysit stupid people.
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Post by Alvamiga on Apr 6, 2014 20:55:02 GMT
Make a fake dust jacket for the book that either looks like a language they won't understand, or with the title "How to smuggle weapons onto an aircraft with the sole purpose of dealing with people who talk to me!"
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DGoeij
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Post by DGoeij on Apr 7, 2014 10:30:02 GMT
I making the assumption here she is a female of breeding age. Therefore she is societally obligated to be available to any male that wishes to make use of his rights of course?
But less sarcastic, this is pretty much impossible. By not wanting to engage in conversation, she'll already be considered rude by the sort of people that would never in their life considering any disruptive behaviour of their own as rude. By being meek about it, it will just take longer for these sort of people to consider her rude, but it will happen, while they'll continuously will ignore any more subdued attempts at ending the interaction. Might as well save everybody a lot of time and be immediately a lot more direct about it. Jayme had a decent suggestion that at least makes things clear from the start.
I think it might be partially cultural, although I think the utter fools who do either ignore or are incapable of taking a less overt hint,might plague every society in some form.
I'm currently trying to get the hang of Australian shopkeepers doing the 'How's your day going?' and apparently expecting some sort of answer. Or any other small talk. This does very rarely happen in urban NL and will keep throwing me off for a while. Australians are naturally chatty it seems and the Dutch are not really.
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Post by JoeP on Apr 7, 2014 13:33:25 GMT
Perhaps she - and DG - could just say "I am Finnish" (while avoiding any possible eye contact).
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Post by Alvamiga on Apr 7, 2014 17:31:10 GMT
Round here, you only get conversation from a few shop people. Most are serve and dump jobs! That's what you get as you head towards the social sink-hole that is London! I keep getting thrown by people greeting me out in the street and starting conversations up North. That only happens here with people who recognise me because they live nearby!
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Post by jayme on Apr 7, 2014 22:49:02 GMT
Perhaps she - and DG - could just say "I am Finnish" (while avoiding any possible eye contact). Ha! Brilliant! And wear this t-shirt:
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Post by DGoeij on Apr 8, 2014 0:18:22 GMT
Hehehe. I don't mind the social interaction that much, but it's different from what I'm used to here alright. In general I have the physical bonus of being tall, dark eyes and eyebrows etc, so a discouraging glance is generally not ignored by attempting chatters, should I want to be left alone. After having been approached almost half a dozen times by surreptitious hashiesh sellers in Lisbon, who seemed oblivious even to the glare combined with a firm no, I resorted to loud indignant Dutch, proclaiming I didn't want HASHIESH, didn't felt the need to buy HASHIESH and they would have to find someone else to sell their HASHIES to. (I figured it wouldn't hurt if people on the other side of the large square could hear the HASHIES too ) I then explained in English if I wanted HASHIESH, I would have bought the HASHIESH in Amsterdam and that having been approached already 5 times before in the hour and a half I was in the city was rather enough. That was the last time I was approached by a hashiesh seller in Lisbon. Granted, it could be that there's only six of them anyway and I just had an in the end unnecessary go at the last one, but somehow I doubt that.
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Post by raspberrybullets on Apr 8, 2014 13:03:05 GMT
After I yelled at the rose guy in Rome we didn't get any more rose botherers eithers. And they all work together so yeah, I think you scared them off.
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Post by JoeP on Apr 8, 2014 13:09:59 GMT
I didn't count how many times I was approached by hash sellers in Lisbon ... not that many I think. No raised voice, no use of eyebrows required ... maybe just an English accent was enough to send them away?
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Post by Alvamiga on Apr 8, 2014 16:33:25 GMT
I have once or twice been approached by someone wanting to buy drugs... ...not sure how to take that!
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Post by spaceflower on Apr 9, 2014 22:22:58 GMT
The story with the idiots who wanted her to change seats is ridiculous, anyway. If it was so important to them to sit together, they should have considered that when they purchased their tickets. If they purchased them too late to get seats together, they needed to put on their big girl/boy panties and deal with it. It is only a few hours! It is not your daughter's responsibility, as a fellow passenger, to have to babysit stupid people. The weird thing is that the man did not seem that interested in sitting with his girl friend. Does not sound like the beginning of a realationhship, more like the end of it ("I'd rather tal to any stranger"). If he himself clearly said that it was his newfound girl friend, she would probalby have changed places. And maybe the man with the broken leg would have left her alone. Not certain of course, maybe he would have started a long conversation of how he broke his leg and how bad he felt. Those people who need constant stimulation from the outside, what do you call them? Extroverts?
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Post by jayme on Apr 9, 2014 22:50:29 GMT
Those people who need constant stimulation from the outside, what do you call them? Extroverts? Yes, extroverts. For some reason they do not like it when I call them agitating, exasperating, soul-sucking demon spawn, or even life-sucking energy vampires.
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Post by spaceflower on Apr 10, 2014 0:14:41 GMT
I have once or twice been approached by someone wanting to buy drugs... ...not sure how to take that! You look like a hippie?
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Post by Moose on Apr 10, 2014 0:25:58 GMT
He does, yes
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Post by Moose on Apr 10, 2014 0:27:07 GMT
To be honest, back in the days when I used to want to buy drugs, which of course are long ago, if I was in an unfamiliar place I just used to approach the nearest long haired guy and ask.
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Post by DGoeij on Apr 10, 2014 3:21:29 GMT
Those people who need constant stimulation from the outside, what do you call them? Extroverts? Yes, extroverts. For some reason they do not like it when I call them agitating, exasperating, soul-sucking demon spawn, or even life-sucking energy vampires. No, that's my little brother to a tee and he agrees. But I usually score high enough on the extrovert scale myself, but am perfectly fine with a book or if available the inflight entertainment system. I suspect something else it going on. To me it very often seems certain people somehow aren't really sure they still exist if they haven't been acknowledged by someone else in the last 2 minutes or so.
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Post by Alvamiga on Apr 10, 2014 7:24:18 GMT
He does, yes You offended the entire population of hippies with that opinion!
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Post by Deleted on Apr 13, 2014 10:11:18 GMT
In a certain place in Bemen, even I have been approached by guys trying to sell. But then I've heard rumours that some big, criminal clan here helps refugees from Africa to come here and then they are forced to pay it off by selling drugs, not sure if that's true. Here in Bremen, all kinds of charity organizations have little stalls in the streets and will approach people and ask them to sign something that obliges them to donate a certain sum of money per year. I hate talking to them, especially since some will not let me go when I say no and then I have to be really rude and just walk away while they are talking. So these days, when I see them, I make a point of not coming near them, but especially the young men will sometimes shout "Hey, don't just avoid us!" or "Hey, here, just a minute!" or still try to walk up to me. In those cases, I have sometimes been very rude, glared at them and told them to leave me alone. I seriously hate those people.
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Post by Mari on Apr 14, 2014 11:21:21 GMT
Ah yes, those. I usually smile at them and shake my head to indicate they shouldn't bother. It's usually enough. If it isn't, I'll tell them I'm not interested. If they don't get the message after that, I'll just walk away. It never comes that far though.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 17, 2014 10:06:46 GMT
I guess for me it has started building up because I used to have problems with saying no to them. I used to tell them I was a student and didn't have enough money to support them on a regular basis and they would start asking questions like how much money I have an if I couldn't just cut down on this or that or pushing me to go for the student rate which was less, but still a lot for me.
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