Comment by null_object | Hacker News Reader

Comment by null_object | Hacker News Reader

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> I guess it depends on the local culture.

This was maybe the hardest transition for me when I moved from London to Stockholm. In London, despite its size and what people often claim is its 'anonymity', there were always many opportunities every single day to have smalltalk with strangers: standing at the bus-stop, in line at the grocery store, looking at albums in a record shop. It really helped to soften the edge of being self-employed, and English people really relish these micro-interactions talking about the weather or jokily disparaging their political leaders.

Coming to Stockholm, the thing that shocked me - I'd even go as far as to say traumatized me to a certain extent - was that Swedish people were completely at ease pretending that others around them were invisible. This went beyond not making smalltalk, and left a deep mark on me which has never been erased. I still find it hard to cope with the erasure that I experience every single day when people behave as though you are not there at all.

A female Swedish journalist that had been a correspondent in Israel for many years and then retired back to her home in Stockholm talked about the invisibility phenomenon very eloquently in a newspaper feature which I've been unable to find online today (it was a few years ago), but she also talked about how upsetting it was, after becoming accustomed to being greeted and 'noticed' by the humans around her as a 'normal' part of her everyday experience, to suddenly disappear into nothingness.

Strangest of all, is that this isn't even a Scandinavian thing: whenever I visit Norway or especially Denmark, strangers constantly try to make smalltalk in all sorts of contexts. Then I always have to apologize for not fully understanding their language (especially the Danes), and when they hear me speaking Swedish they usually give up on me instantly - Swedes being well-known for their unsociability in those parts.

Sad to say, after 20 years I've also adjusted my own behavior to the Swedish norm, and usually find the approach of a sociable Dane with some nervous trepidation.

Yes, I quite liked this about New York city, too. "Wow, look at that thing, it's about to fall". Anyone can start talking to you. I was on a business trip and having a coffee near Times Square when an American tourist just commented about a crane on a tall building nearby and then proceeded to tell me all about his life experiences, about the heat in Arizona, his war experiences, etc; It was very refreshing and "humane", for lack of a better word. It happens all the time in India, too, where I was born, but somehow, I did not expect folks in the US to be chatty. I guess I presumed they are more worried about privacy and stranger danger!

Here's an analogy: imagine a neural network having to train it's neurons but without them having any connections to each other! Is such a thing even possible? Interconnections are what help us tune to (maybe even perceive) reality!

> Coming to Stockholm, the thing that shocked me - I'd even go as far as to say traumatized me to a certain extent - was that Swedish people were completely at ease pretending that others around them were invisible.

For a very extreme version of this: In Germany there are somewhat regular cases of duty to rescue charges against people because they just straight up ignored a person in distress.

One of the worse cases was a 82 years old man collapsing at a bank ATM and going unconscious [0]: Four people were just ignoring him on the ground, literally stepping over the body to keep doing their banking, it took 20 minutes until somebody who found him actually called for help, he ended up dying in the hospital.

[0] https://www.sueddeutsche.de/panorama/nordrhein-westfalen-82-...

As a swede and an introvert I feel the opposite whenever I'm visiting the US or some other country where people just can't seem to leave me alone.

I remember the first time I went to LA and people were walking up to me and started talking to me out of nowhere and I was like "what the hell is wrong with these people and why are they talking to me? I don't know them". I was so exhausted after two weeks that I basically stayed inside my apartment for a week when I got home to Sweden.

>>Coming to Stockholm, the thing that shocked me - I'd even go as far as to say traumatized me to a certain extent - was that Swedish people were completely at ease pretending that others around them were invisible.

I have to be honest - that sounds lovely. I'm sorry it affected you negatively, but that sounds like gold standard of social interaction for me.

This is not the Swedish norm, this is Stockholm culture. Go to a small village and walk around pretending that other people are invisable, and you will have the police called on you for acting like a psyco.

Edit: In fact, people pretending that others are invisable are the easiest way to spot the outsiders who only come here to steal our outboard motors

I'm always hesitant to get into these types of discussions on HN, as I find that some people are quite defensive about sweeping 'national characteristics' (and in many ways, quite rightly so), and of course there are exceptions and gradations of severity, but having lived here in Sweden for slightly over 20 years, and having lived in Stockholm but also spent long periods of time in the family and friends' towns and villages, I'd say that even though the behavioral pattern is most acute in Stockholm, even outside in the countryside or in small towns the contrast to other countries I've lived in or visited is very great.

Thanks for sharing. I completely agree with you that from the three, Danish, Swedish and Norwegian, I find the Swedes to be the least open for spontaneous interaction and they definitely don't smile nearly as much as Danes. I always wondered why is there such a difference between two nations that are so close...

Thanks for sharing, as a native Swede things like this are always very interesting to read.

I basically feel a need to jokingly apologize when my 2.5-year old waves and says "hi hi" to strangers outside. :)

I grew up in Stockholm and can definitely relate. People are super reserved, except for when drinking or traveling abroad.

I'm from eastern europe and I just thought that's what city etiquette is. I'm not going to say hi to every one of the 200 strangers I see on my daily walk...

Talking on the bus stop? What?

>I'm not going to say hi to every one of the 200 strangers I see on my daily walk..

>Talking on the bus stop? What?

I don't want to suggest that your post is in bad faith, but it does seem to be willfully misinterpreting what I was describing.

Quite obviously people aren't heartily haling every total stranger they meet walking down Oxford Street in London. But in small encounters there's not only the custom to be polite and acknowledge the other people around you, there's an expectation that you'll make smalltalk, and reduce the friction of everyday city life. It shows consideration, and it's considered to be a mark of civilization.

I'm sure for shy people it could be seen as a negative, but if the bus is delayed and you and one other person are left standing at the stop for 30 more minutes, a few words grumbling about the transport service, and then the weather, are a way to soften the discomfort.

And as others have pointed-out, it has utility in everyday life: people 'noticing' each other can even save lives. In Stockholm I cannot even begin to enumerate the number of times I've stepped into a situation that others have ignored, staring straight ahead and behaving as though they're alone in the city.

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