It’s an honest question guys. Do I look easy? By easy, I don’t mean “do you think you could get me into bed without much effort?” (the answer to which is most positively, 100 percently, very definitely no!); what I mean is “does it look like you can exploit my Shwetaness easily?”. Hmm, bad choice of words again? Let me try to explain what I mean.
The other day (Monday), I got off the bus at my wonderfully brilliant university (with earphones in, listening to some wonderfully awesome jmac) when a guy thrust a book in my direction. Assuming it was just another flyer, I extended my hand and accepted it (a simple act of kindness, since I always feel pretty sorry for these guys who stand on the corner of some street and are constantly rejected by passers by, on my part) only to be stopped by him and asked for money. I was in a bit of a predicament. The book was already in my hand, so there’s no way I could’ve said “no” and handed it back; that would’ve just been far too heartless and unkind. But I really didn’t want to give him money for a book that I would never read. Looking at him, I thought to myself “why in the world did he have to pick me, there are a hundred other people walking by; do I seriously look like such an easy target?”. I felt bad, so I handed him a few dollars (it might not sound like much but for a uni student without an income, a couple of dollars here and there makes a pretty big dent in the hip pocket). I know that makes me sound cheap, but I detest spending money on things that I don’t really want (at all)! Anyway, I handed him the money, only to have him ask me “so, where are you from?”. He was happy someone hadn’t rejected him – fair enough; well, fair enough until he decided to tell me that my country must be “in a really bad way and quite corrupt” since so many Nepalese were migrating to Western countries. I politely excused myself and walked away (excuse: a class that wasn’t scheduled to start for another three hours), fuming.
Anyway, here are a couple of completely normal, very non-posed, natural photos (ha, that sounds extremely silly and quite vain). You be the judge; do I look easy? I’d very much like to know what you guys think. If the answer’s yes, how can I look less so?
On a completely different note, I really want to watch 500 Days of Summer, UP, Coraline and Adam. Hopefully I’ll be watching 500 Days of Summer with Jen, PV and Jas. I think my sister really wants to watch UP and Coraline, so if I see them, I’ll probably go with her. Not sure about Adam. Maybe I’ll just wait until I can get my hands on it to watch at home. Have any of you watched any of the movies? What did you think of them? Let me know!
Stay wonderful, cheerful, amazing and well readers!
x.
3 thoughts:
it's not a question of "are you easy" it's a question of are you a kind person or not. You said you felt bad for the people who get rejected constantly and you gave the guy a few dollars. That's being nice, even though it was implied that you should. When I was in Australia a guy handed me a dvd about a band and asked for a few dollars and I did it, I gave money to a homeless person also. I'm also pretty sure I inadvertently gave money to a guy who may have been on drugs =S I dunno, I guess I can't answer your question because I AM easy lol....I'm so freakin' easy....in more ways than one =(
UP is still possibly the BEST movie I've seen all year. If you can, you should definitely see it in 3-D. The movie struck a nerve w/ me via the main character of Carl. I think it's the way that people treat him like he's incapable although he can do a lot more than anyone cares to see
I think you answered your own question in your next post. As you said yourself, you're a person with a contagious smile who can become great friends with people you meet on trains. Clearly, you have a very high "approachability" quotient. Also, the fact that you initially like everyone you meet is probably apparent in your body language and mannerisms. People feel comfortable approaching you. That's often a good thing, but sometimes it's not.
I really don't think there's anything you can do about it - you really can't help but be yourself. However, if there are times when you REALLY don't want random people to approach you, you can try the following:
1) Walk around with a really mean surly look on you face. Try to look as intimidating as possible. Make people think that they just might get their ass kicked if they f*ck with you. OK, maybe that might not work for you considering your size, so instead you could try ...
2) Talk to yourself. Talk to yourself out loud. Talk to yourself out loud A LOT. People tend to avoid crazy people.
I think another reason why people who want to sell something tend to approach you is that they must get a sense from the way you carry yourself that you would be an easy mark. After all, you did actually give the guy money when you had absolutely no obligation to. I think that most people, if put in your situation, would have simply politely apologized for taking the book, and then given the guy the book back ( Which is actually more than the guy deserves. A guy who shoves books in people's faces and then demands money doesn't even deserve an apology. Of course, this is probably just my own personal bias. I hate anything that even remotely resembles "a hard sell". I don't even like it when salespeople at stores ask me if I need any help. ). There's nothing wrong with being nice to people, but I think that some people get into trouble because they are afraid to offend anyone and want everyone to like them. I'm not going to presume that you're that way, but wife if definitely that way ( She makes an effort to act super-sweet towards people she hates, and it really winds up tearing her up inside ) and I'm definitely NOT that way. I have nothing against being nice and polite to people, but if somebody is rude to me, I'm not going to go through the effort of being nice and polite. I don't really wish anybody ill-will, but I have no interest in being friendly to somebody who is not really interested in being my friend. Thus, I've never had problems being brusque with somebody who is trying to sell me something. I'm really a door-to-door salesman's worst nightmare.
Speaking of people who are rude, I'm curious if this book-hawking dude was being rude even before he started trashing Nepal. Depending on how he asked the question, "where are you from?" can be a rather rude question. Think back to the subject matter of my first YouTube video ( the part about the person asking Ruth the "where are you from?" question ). I've been on this earth for almost 40 years, and I can barely remember any occasions where somebody asked me "where are you from?". The only times it happened was when I was on vacation, and when people asked it in that context, they assumed the answer be some location in the USA. I've never been asked that question by somebody who expected me to name the European country where my ancestors came from.
Perhaps that kind of thing bothers me too much, but it all has to do with the way I feel about my country and about what I feels it means to be an American ( I actually promised Pax a blog entry about "What America Means to Me", so I'll be writing that soon.). Of course, I don't really know what things are like in Australia or if this guy was trying to be rude, but I'll make that assumption for now considering how he trashed Nepal.
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