Hello, stranger – Talking to random people

Now to admit my hippocrite bonafides: I talked to a random guy the other day, and we both seemed to enjoy it. But we were unexpectedly in each other's way at a boat ramp, and in exchange for asking him to move his trailer, I offered to help him move stuff. He refused my help, I stubbornly loaded my boat up myself without asking for his help (though I needed it) and we had a nice chat by the car window on the way out. I think I liked talking to him because he seemed equally happy to be as stubborn and introverted as me. :)

For some reason, apparently, I look like the kind of person people should open up to, and so they approach me and oh boy do they open up. I get the crazies - moon landing denialists, people who think other people are secretly wolves, flat earthers who say "I thought you looked like a fellow traveler", various apparnet schizophrenics who hand me 50+ page printed resumes (not a joke or exaggeration), chain smokers who think I can help them with their struggles with their mothers, people claiming to have taken part in Ross Perot's Iran hostage rescue, young women who urgently want to have sex right now without a condom (I am not good looking and they are usually shaking or twitching and often wandering around in sweat pants), and so on. I've even met famous people more than once, well, dopplegangers had taken over their lives so they'd lost their fame - it had been stolen.

I generally like talking to people, and will happily talk to total strangers, but given my experience I am hesitant to initiate conversations - because i wonder - sure, I don't believe in weird outlandish things, but what if I am also a crazy? Do the crazies know what they are? And so I don't.

That's nice to see.

I'm friendly and comfortable talking to strangers but usually avoid it because folks tend to draw it out.

Personally, I detest using digital kiosks and strongly prefer placing my order with a human, even if your examples happen.

I stopped going to a sandwich shop I used to visit nearly every workday because they switched to a kiosk to place your sandwich order.

Due to Canada's immigration policies and economic policies, retail and fast food jobs that used to be done by local high school or college students are now often done by foreign-born adults instead. Unfortunately, many of these staff have poor English and/or French skills.

When ordering a meal verbally, miscommunications and misunderstandings creep in far too easily, even for what used to be simple and routine orders.

At first, I thought I was being unclear in some way, but more and more I started noticing the same thing happening to other people who were ordering before or after me. Communication issues that just didn't exist before have become the norm.

Thanks to this and skyrocketing prices, I don't go to fast food restaurants as often as I'd like to. If a place doesn't have a kiosk for ordering, I'll just leave.

Same with the grocery stores near me. Nothing wrong with the cashiers, but it's just so much faster to checkout for myself. I've found the same at restaurants as well. I get full exploration of the options at a kiosk, kind of like the benefits of a GUI vs TUI interface. The menu rarely has all the options (at least around me).

But I still prefer digital kiosks. It gives me more time to go over the menu and compare the prices of different combinations, discover more options, and I can give more exact instructions about how I need it to be prepared etc.

Talking to strangers is fantastic but the meaningful difference between given your Big Mac order to a human rather than a screen is minimal.

I'm happy to smalltalk with strangers, but I use the machines as I hate ambiguity. I often had orders misheard or misunderstood and prefer to explicitly select and see what I want in an unambiguous way, if I can.

Even with something as a single drink this can become a problem.. a venti soy mocha frappuccino with vegan whipped cream or whatever, let alone when you might have several people's orders to make at once and not mess up.

Talking to strangers is great fun, and the ambiguity there can make it more so! Relaying and verifying precise information to a stranger? Not fun.

BTW, do you see any difference between Amsterdam and Limburg?

The "we" here being "The Dutch". Pretty much everywhere (other than Eastern Europe maybe) is it easier to talk to random strangers. I've also never seen any place where it's more socially accepted to be a complete dickhead to strangers (other than locals in overcrowded tourists destinations, but that's a special case). After spending a few years abroad I found it absolutely shocking.

This reduces costs by reducing man hours. This increases communication since you are not playing telephone.

Literally everyone wins.

Wouldn't you rather spend the 20 seconds talking to your buddy or 20 seconds asking where to put the credit card?

I just assume those humans at the workplace have other tasks--even just idle daydreams--they'd rather be spending their time on, especially when they aren't making signals that they'd love to chat.

I suspect its because I generally talk to strangers to have a proper multiminute convo and find brief interactions either pointless or stressful.

Every day I talk to random people. Eat breakfast at a lunch counter and greet anybody who sits nearby. Last one was a medical student, asked if he knew my daughter-in-law, he remembered her! She's on to Residency now; he's doing some rounds or something, he wasn't clear, but it was his day off(!) and he planned to slack, take a walk, anything but be in the hospital.

I know all the staff at the diner by name, and something about their lives. I've seen Steven's brother's wedding pictures, know about Izzy's poor puppy and his problems. Stephanie is looking for work in marketing management. Madison has been working the family restaurant business since she was four!

The grocery-store mention works for me too. I say something about whatever folks have going on. "Wow you buy healthier stuff than me!" is a good start, even if it isn't true. Or "You must be shopping for a crew!" gets a good response - everybody like to talk about their kids. Or even "Wow it's raining cats and dogs!" and suchlike.

I endorse this idea, that we're all passengers on this trip and should get to know our nearby voyagers if at all possible.

Folks are conditioned to respond to these people without acting scared or unwilling because they don't want to be physically or verbally attacked. This is especially true for women. You may think that someone is open, but for some of them, they're actually scared of you. Your bit of joy is their bit of fear.

Even your initial anecdote shows you're missing some social clues. Service workers don't want to talk to you. They're paid to interact with you. Yes, some may be extroverts and enjoy having a conversation. Others may dread folks starting long awkward conversations that they have no way to escape.

There's socially acceptable places to have conversations with strangers. Bars (to a point), social activities meant for socializing, hobby communities, etc. This is a way better way to get social interaction, and one where you're going to generally have more rewarding interaction as people are there for that reason and are open to it.

There is also a Google sheet for packing to go on trips. Each column is a trip, with rows labeled with items, and the intersecting cells filled with NA or an X when packed.

Some family members make fun of it, but we rarely forget to bring things.

I don't know if that's really the case. When I worked retail I mostly really liked chatting with customers.

Now, neither self-checkout nor human register display some discounts, because they're using the same system, and the system applies those discounts at the end. But here's a thing: I can ask about promotions and prices while the cashier is scanning. Also, if I realize after paying that something is wrong, I can immediately dispute it with the cashier, instead of waiting for the employee to maybe come in the next 5 minutes (they're probably on the other side of the store, busy unloading some boxes).

As for the pressure, I personally feel much more pressure coming from an unyielding machine than from a human.

I think you're right about some people. But it's true of any job. Some people are pleasant in that job and some people are the opposite. Just because you don't scan boxes of diapers for 8 hours doesn't mean you're immune from this behavior.

I think it's just a matter of treatment, frankly. Many cashier-like workers are treated like garbage. Imagine instead if the grocery store cashier had a pleasant or even funny conversation with everyone in their line over the day - I think it would measurably improve their mood.

Once on a train, two women come up to me as they’re getting in, and start talking (so I take out the earbuds). Turns out they just needed directions and were here for vacation, with no phone service. I saw that they needed to take my stop, so I offered to help and had a nice conversation for 15 minutes with their broken English. They were super friendly and excited to be traveling through my city, and it really made my day to be able to help them and learn about their travel!

I wish I had moments like that all the time with strangers.

But yeah, I interpret headphones as "leave me alone".

Although from the article in the Netherlands, I suspect another reason why people use kiosks, is that folks working service jobs might not speak the language fluently, or the person was a tourist. I'm not criticizing anyone, I think it's a nice feature of kiosks.

Perhaps it is good to add that I do try to gauge other people's willingness to talk before making any move. It gets easier to recognise and - this is something the author of the book noted to - somehow other people that are willing to talk sort of engage by themselves as if they recognise my willingness to talk. I think this happens because of non-verbal clues we are capable of picking up because of our evolution as species.

And I am sure you would signal as "do not disturb" on my "stranger radar" - which I would absolutely respect diligently. Happy day to you, too. :-)

> "Where are you going?" It is good to add that this is not my first question. Like you suggested, it is better to start with something that can be perceived by both parties (the author in the book refers to this as triangulation), you talk about something 'simple and stupid' like the weather to 'gauge' if the other party is interested in engaging. The author of the book (Joe Keohane) actually gives a bunch of tips to prevent the conversation from stalling because of 'standard script' (e.g. standard conditioned questions+responses like 'how do you do'). Worth the deep dive if you're experimenting and looking to get the balance right (and prevent to be perceived as the 'town's fool'. )

How have you ever met a person? Everyone was a stranger to you at some point.

Some randos on the plane can be good convo. Met some interesting and nice people on the craps tables, conferences, festivals, fellow or opposing fans at sports events. When I travel, I usually end up collecting strangers as part of the experience.

But yeah out and about they're often sketchy. If they're painful to me, I'll lean into it and try to figure out how they got there and you can often pull some interesting or ridiculous stories (ex: alien encounters)

You put my experience into words exactly.

Anyway, I don't have kids, I don't watch sports, I don't go to parties or do drugs, I watch maybe 2 movies a year, and I don't like talking about religion or politics. So 99% of people would consider me impossible to talk to.

Precisely. Even in my clubs/bars drinking strategy of approaching strangers, I make great effort to become "familiar" to them before making the move.

In fact picking up a random stranger for a conversation is in no way different than picking a chick for a possible later "good time" in a club.

First and foremost you need to become nonverbally accustomed to them and they to you. And unless pushing for town's idiot, need to get the signals that they are OK talking to you. Otherwise especially when booze is involved, things can get messy fast. (You gotta be prepared for this situation too if you do this).

Another well accepted context for strangers to engage is when something bad or disastrous happens. Better not wait until that time, but it is easy to understand that boundaries fall away when the going gets tough. It is a survival mechanism.

VC: Well that woman was mean to me at Starbucks once… here’s $1B

There was some period of 6 months where for some reason (I believe it was cause I was living overseas for 2 years in a country without my native language, then returning back to where I could finally talk again) I was very outgoing and talkative.

It was glorious and I happily talked with everyone. Would crack jokes at people as I passed them by on the street.

Unfortunately Philly beat the reserved "heads down" scowl I was used to back into me.

From TFA:

> When was the last time you greeted somebody you didn't know? When did you spontaneously engage in a conversation? Chances are you don't even remember! Likely either you or the other person were "busy" with other things (like tinkering with a smartphone).

Yikes. I make idle chit-chat with strangers all the time, and it's not always me starting it. The last time I was at a bar I got into a conversation with the guy next to me for almost 30 minutes.

> We shop online, scan our groceries at the self-checkout, order a taxi via an app, and sit behind our screens in the cafe or coffee bar. Contact with random strangers is becoming rarer and rarer.

The author is describing what's happening in their life, which is the result of their choices and their circumstances: where they live, the kind of work they do, what they feel comfortable doing, the habits they've acquired. Other people have different experiences.

> But I prefer ordering digitally. Better discovery, lower ambiguity, electronic upsell and tips are easier to ignore.

Indeed these are benefits, however I keep finding the digital ordering to be slower than just telling a human (who is an expert at the software interface) what I want. This way I don't have to figure out with each new interface how to customize the order. And oh man the bugs. The last two times I've tried online ordering for McDonalds it's glitched out, never again.

By offering yourself as attentive listener, random strangers that you engage with can feel comfortable enough to share a little more than just smalltalk. The book discusses several cases where folks with very different backgrounds and ideas actually come together, sometimes even forming friendships.

As I am not a psychologist I do not know the accepted definition of "connecting", but I am sure it needs more than just smalltalk. I don't know, I am just a random guy doing a little experiment. :-)

I have often felt like the nectar for a hungry extravert to feed on, and when they are done with me, it turns out they never actually cared about ~me~; they just needed to feed on the social interaction with me to gain energy for themselves. I was just a means to an end for them.

As an introvert who craves meaningful connection, I have found myself being used and drained by extraverts countless times. I am as a consequence very wary of them.

Taking your feedback into account I will try to get this nuance better in my writing, but please forgive me as I am "just an amateur with a blog". :-)

The society we are building now where everyone retreats into their own world all the time is disturbing. We tell people to "just go meet people" when they're feeling down, yet there is increasingly nowhere to do that!