apparently I feel like Yakov Smirnov
0 Comments Published by ginny on Wednesday, January 16, 2002 at 2:48 PM.
9:48 a.m. 12 July 2002
What a country! Except, of course, I’m not talking about the US. I’m talking about the UK. Which doesn’t, I think, have comedians like Yakov Smirnov.
But still. What a country!
As in, they really seem to have some sort of obsession with reporting really minor engineering mishaps that occur while repairing tube lines. Which really strikes me as somewhat odd and extremely funny. When the BBC had an intensive, fifteen minute long report on how some engineers doing repair work to the District line had used “the wrong sort of spanner,” including terrible graphic animation of a spanner repeatedly not fitting on a nut, which they played, in slow motion, over and over again, we thought it was hilarious. We repeated it to each other whenever we thought of it. We blamed all troubles on “wrong sort of spanner.”
But this morning, as I was reading over the shoulder of the woman next to me on the tube (yes, I do this. everyone does it. Well, you don’t expect me to get my own newspaper, do you? Do you?) I noticed an enormous article on “Wrong rail line!” Subheading: “Engineering team spends time working on wrong rail line.” I guess they’re really interested in engineering works here.
Also. So I’m not a what you would call a social butterfly, right? I’ve had precisely two boyfriends and only a very few . . .um . . .romantic assignations beyond that. All have taken place in the last four years. None before that. And I have never been asked out on a date. Not once. Ever. Both relationships started in a less formal manner, and progressed immediately to relationship-status, skipping getting-to-know-person-on-date status.
So, that’s me. Socially active, I am not. I always figured I just wasn’t the type that got asked out. Wrong look, too shy, something like that.
But. I’m here, in London, precisely ten days before I am asked out by some random guy who walked next to me at the tube station, of all things. (This is Shane, of previous entry.) And previous to that, when we’d been clubbing, this guy I danced with repeatedly told me he “wanted to be my boyfriend, but did not want to take me home.” Also promised to “treat me right.” I know you kind of can’t count this, as he would probably have asked out any girl he danced with, but still, not a common experience for me. And then yesterday, only eleven days into my residence in this country, keep in mind, some random French guy I’m standing next to on the train asks for my e-mail! Absolutely crazy. Completely and absolutely crazy. What a country!
Carrie thinks it’s because I seem too friendly. I maintain that it’s completely normal if your eyes happen to meet someone else’s, just by accident – you know, the way that just sometimes happens, because you’re in a close space with people – like I said, I think it’s normal when that happens to flash this sort of half-smile.
It’s not a real, “let’s be friends” smile or anything. Just a brief twitch of the mouth upwards. Basically, I think it’s a signal of “I mean no harm. Do not be offended that I looked at you. Not a threat. Not challenging you.”
Like when people do that social laugh that doesn’t have anything to do with things being funny. Have you ever noticed that? Like when people introduce themselves in a formal or uncomfortable situation. “Hi, I’m Jim Smith . . .heh heh!” they’ll say. Or “Nice to meet you . . .heh heh heh.” It looks weird when I type it out, but believe me, people do it. Listen next time you’re in that kind of situation. People do this little half-laugh all the time, and what it basically means is “I’m in a non-threat situation with you. I am not challenging, I am offering peace.” We do it when there’s a possibility for stress or threat built into the situation – like when we’re meeting someone who has power over us or might be a business rival, or when we’re uncomfortable or in new surroundings. Things like that.
Interestingly enough, chimpanzees do it too. It’s built into the primate system as one of this various ways we stratify social interactions into threat and non-threat. Another way is extending hands. That’s why we shake hands with people. Because that way you can show (on an unconscious, social-group level, that is), that you’re not holding a weapon, and that you’re putting yourself in a position of relative vulnerability or undefendedness with the other person, because this is not a threat interaction, this is a friendly interaction.
Yeah, so anyway, I maintain that this little half-smile thing I do is the same as that social laugh, or as not folding your arms. It shows I’m not being offensive or rude, but am instead simply going about my business of living in a non-threatening, non-intrusive manner. I did not mean to intrude your conceptual space unwillingly. I am simply coexisting peacefully in this croweded environment with you.
But Carrie thinks this half-smile thing is weird, and no one else does it, and it’s being read a sign that I’m interested in people. Which is not the signal I mean to be sending. I have a completely different look (which I do not employ often at all) for that.
I don’t know. I don’t think I can stop the half-smile thing. It’s instinctive. I caught myself doing it three times on the tube alone this morning. And I just did it here at my desk when I looked up and caught Charlotte’s eye.
I think maybe it’s just this country. Lot more people here. And maybe I somehow look more approachable. I do dress differently from most Londoners. Maybe it’s just that they think foreigners are easy or something. Or maybe it’s the new haircut. I know for a fact that men seem to find women with shorter hair more sexually approachable than women with longer hair, for all their professions of loving long hair.
But whatever the reason, I’m not interested in any of these guys! Not a one. French guy was funny, but only because he didn’t speak English hardly at all. Not funny in an “I’d like to have sex with you” kind of way. Not at all. I don’t know that I’m particularly interested in dating any men right now. Don’t feel like it. It isn’t one of those times in my life. Where were all these guys in high school when I cared that no one thought I was attractive. Nowadays, I don’t welcome the attention at all – in fact, it bothers me. (though I might check out a lesbian bar. Scary, scary. Another thing I’ve never done is go to a bar and check people out. Or be checked out. Don’t know if I’d enjoy it at all. I think I’m far more likely to if it’s all women, though. Women aren’t nearly as threatening.)
And like I said last entry, I don’t think I even like dating. It’s boring. I’d much rather do something interesting. Maybe it’s different if you’re at all attracted to the person you’re sitting there discussing completely uninteresting things with. But I doubt it.
Anyway, all I can say is this: what a country! What a country, I tell you.
My grandmother, of course, would tell me that what I need is to find a synagogue and meet some nice young (English) Jewish boys. In fact, she has told me as much. I’ll bet they’re the same everywhere. I.e., think I’m weird and not like any other Jewish girls. At this point, that would be a relief, I think.
What a country! Except, of course, I’m not talking about the US. I’m talking about the UK. Which doesn’t, I think, have comedians like Yakov Smirnov.
But still. What a country!
As in, they really seem to have some sort of obsession with reporting really minor engineering mishaps that occur while repairing tube lines. Which really strikes me as somewhat odd and extremely funny. When the BBC had an intensive, fifteen minute long report on how some engineers doing repair work to the District line had used “the wrong sort of spanner,” including terrible graphic animation of a spanner repeatedly not fitting on a nut, which they played, in slow motion, over and over again, we thought it was hilarious. We repeated it to each other whenever we thought of it. We blamed all troubles on “wrong sort of spanner.”
But this morning, as I was reading over the shoulder of the woman next to me on the tube (yes, I do this. everyone does it. Well, you don’t expect me to get my own newspaper, do you? Do you?) I noticed an enormous article on “Wrong rail line!” Subheading: “Engineering team spends time working on wrong rail line.” I guess they’re really interested in engineering works here.
Also. So I’m not a what you would call a social butterfly, right? I’ve had precisely two boyfriends and only a very few . . .um . . .romantic assignations beyond that. All have taken place in the last four years. None before that. And I have never been asked out on a date. Not once. Ever. Both relationships started in a less formal manner, and progressed immediately to relationship-status, skipping getting-to-know-person-on-date status.
So, that’s me. Socially active, I am not. I always figured I just wasn’t the type that got asked out. Wrong look, too shy, something like that.
But. I’m here, in London, precisely ten days before I am asked out by some random guy who walked next to me at the tube station, of all things. (This is Shane, of previous entry.) And previous to that, when we’d been clubbing, this guy I danced with repeatedly told me he “wanted to be my boyfriend, but did not want to take me home.” Also promised to “treat me right.” I know you kind of can’t count this, as he would probably have asked out any girl he danced with, but still, not a common experience for me. And then yesterday, only eleven days into my residence in this country, keep in mind, some random French guy I’m standing next to on the train asks for my e-mail! Absolutely crazy. Completely and absolutely crazy. What a country!
Carrie thinks it’s because I seem too friendly. I maintain that it’s completely normal if your eyes happen to meet someone else’s, just by accident – you know, the way that just sometimes happens, because you’re in a close space with people – like I said, I think it’s normal when that happens to flash this sort of half-smile.
It’s not a real, “let’s be friends” smile or anything. Just a brief twitch of the mouth upwards. Basically, I think it’s a signal of “I mean no harm. Do not be offended that I looked at you. Not a threat. Not challenging you.”
Like when people do that social laugh that doesn’t have anything to do with things being funny. Have you ever noticed that? Like when people introduce themselves in a formal or uncomfortable situation. “Hi, I’m Jim Smith . . .heh heh!” they’ll say. Or “Nice to meet you . . .heh heh heh.” It looks weird when I type it out, but believe me, people do it. Listen next time you’re in that kind of situation. People do this little half-laugh all the time, and what it basically means is “I’m in a non-threat situation with you. I am not challenging, I am offering peace.” We do it when there’s a possibility for stress or threat built into the situation – like when we’re meeting someone who has power over us or might be a business rival, or when we’re uncomfortable or in new surroundings. Things like that.
Interestingly enough, chimpanzees do it too. It’s built into the primate system as one of this various ways we stratify social interactions into threat and non-threat. Another way is extending hands. That’s why we shake hands with people. Because that way you can show (on an unconscious, social-group level, that is), that you’re not holding a weapon, and that you’re putting yourself in a position of relative vulnerability or undefendedness with the other person, because this is not a threat interaction, this is a friendly interaction.
Yeah, so anyway, I maintain that this little half-smile thing I do is the same as that social laugh, or as not folding your arms. It shows I’m not being offensive or rude, but am instead simply going about my business of living in a non-threatening, non-intrusive manner. I did not mean to intrude your conceptual space unwillingly. I am simply coexisting peacefully in this croweded environment with you.
But Carrie thinks this half-smile thing is weird, and no one else does it, and it’s being read a sign that I’m interested in people. Which is not the signal I mean to be sending. I have a completely different look (which I do not employ often at all) for that.
I don’t know. I don’t think I can stop the half-smile thing. It’s instinctive. I caught myself doing it three times on the tube alone this morning. And I just did it here at my desk when I looked up and caught Charlotte’s eye.
I think maybe it’s just this country. Lot more people here. And maybe I somehow look more approachable. I do dress differently from most Londoners. Maybe it’s just that they think foreigners are easy or something. Or maybe it’s the new haircut. I know for a fact that men seem to find women with shorter hair more sexually approachable than women with longer hair, for all their professions of loving long hair.
But whatever the reason, I’m not interested in any of these guys! Not a one. French guy was funny, but only because he didn’t speak English hardly at all. Not funny in an “I’d like to have sex with you” kind of way. Not at all. I don’t know that I’m particularly interested in dating any men right now. Don’t feel like it. It isn’t one of those times in my life. Where were all these guys in high school when I cared that no one thought I was attractive. Nowadays, I don’t welcome the attention at all – in fact, it bothers me. (though I might check out a lesbian bar. Scary, scary. Another thing I’ve never done is go to a bar and check people out. Or be checked out. Don’t know if I’d enjoy it at all. I think I’m far more likely to if it’s all women, though. Women aren’t nearly as threatening.)
And like I said last entry, I don’t think I even like dating. It’s boring. I’d much rather do something interesting. Maybe it’s different if you’re at all attracted to the person you’re sitting there discussing completely uninteresting things with. But I doubt it.
Anyway, all I can say is this: what a country! What a country, I tell you.
My grandmother, of course, would tell me that what I need is to find a synagogue and meet some nice young (English) Jewish boys. In fact, she has told me as much. I’ll bet they’re the same everywhere. I.e., think I’m weird and not like any other Jewish girls. At this point, that would be a relief, I think.
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