Despite my mild case of RBF (Resting Bitch Face) and the occasional shade that makes it past my brain-to-mouth filtering system, I actually am a very nice, patient person. I make it a rule never to say anything derogatory about people - both in public and in private - and to not make snap judgements about the people I meet. I'm also a fairly good listener because for a little while, I grew up knowing what it was like to be ignored or shuffled to the side as an afterthought. But contrary to popular belief, there is a limit to my patience. And I am not Hermione's magic purse - there is only so much ignorant and shallow chitchat I can let you get away with before I start mentally disemboweling you and saving you for the black list (i.e. public yet anonymous humiliation on this blog). That's right. You should be scared. A grand total of five people on the internet will soon know of your failings as a human being.
Side note: This post isn't
really a name and shame post. (Gosh who do you think I am? Regina George?) But it is a list of some of my pet peeves when talking to people, although most of them are intended to be humorous and perhaps even relateable.
Number 1: "The I'm Not Boasting About My Sexual Prowess But I Actually Am" Guy
So a couple of weeks ago, I met a guy on one of my many side jobs/activities. Because this guy got on my nerves so much, I'm going to mean-spiritedly dub him "Roy". Roy is your typical 20-something university student, but his ego is atypical in that it probably rivals that of Kanye West's. Roy likes to talk about girls. Okay sure. All guys like to talk about girls to some extent (and in the spirit of gender neutrality, girls about boys too). So being my typical, easygoing, agreeable self, I laughed along with his stories, even though a lot of them were as funny as roadkill.
But Roy wouldn't stop talking about his experiences with girls. Conversations usually went something like:
Roy: Ughh, so frustrated...
Me: Why?
Roy: Just having some issues with girls.
Me: Yeah...? (in my I'm not really that interested tone of voice)
Roy: I just seem to attract girls with a lot of drama, you know what I mean?
Me: Can't say I-
Roy: Like I met this girl at a party right, and like we started seeing each other and now everything's all complicated 'cause like I think she wants something more but I don't do commitment and yada yada yada look at me I'm such a big player and shit etc. etc.
You get the point. Every week it'll be a new girl, a new drama and some mention of getting drunk at parties and hooking up with randoms and I DON'T EVEN KNOW BUT IS THIS SUPPOSED TO IMPRESS PEOPLE OR SOMETHING 'CAUSE RIGHT NOW IT'S JUST MAKING YOU LOOK LIKE THE MALE VERSION OF PROMISCUOUS TAYLOR SWIFT.
And don't even get me started on the casual sexism.
Roy: Hey, I need some relationship advice.
Me: Well you really shouldn't be asking m-
Roy: I mean you're a girl. So tell me, from a girl's perspective, how should guys try to impress you?
Me: Err, it kind of depends on the type of girl
Roy: All girls like going out to dinner and stuff right? 'Cause like I did that but we haven't been texting much in the last few days. And that's the other thing, why do all girls do that thing where they don't reply to your texts for a long time yada yada yada yada zzzzz.
Well here's a tip for you genius. Maybe if you glued your mouth shut, girls would like you better?
Number 2: The Racist Asian Parent
My dad is a great dad, don't get me wrong. He did everything right while raising me, including taking me to the library every fortnight for seven years just so I always had books to read, and driving me to school when I still went to Sydney Girls. But he is obviously not a perfect human being and one of his key and most irredeemable faults is that he holds undeniably racist views.
Dad's type of racism is not immediately identifiable, mainly because he's worked at a company now for almost 25 years and through that, he's made a couple of friends from all different backgrounds and ethnicities. He's not a "blatant racist" (if such a thing exists) but he definitely has his own prejudices and not matter how hard I try to make him see reason, he's stubbornly held on to them.
We've got neighbours from Kenya and some from middle-eastern countries and whilst my dad would occasionally make small talk with them about the weather and work, in the privacy of our home, he'd sometimes come up with some really gross and unfair generalisations about Lebanese Australians or African immigrants. For example, my mum would mention something about bicycles in our driveway and then my dad would say something like, "It was probably the African kids next door". And then I would ask him how he came to that conclusion and he'd say something totally ignorant like that's just how they are.
I know. It's terrible. I'm not even going to type out what he said about our middle-eastern neighbours due to the fear of having this blog flagged.
And my parent's racism isn't even restricted to non-Asian people. They've got a lot to say about Vietnamese people, despite more than half of their friends being from Vietnam and they having grown up in the COUNTRY THEMSELVES. Like I can't even.
When I was younger, I used to get into huge arguments with my parents over this. They'd usually end up with me little ol' me crying from frustration and my parents having no change in perspective whatsoever. If you ever want the definition of "unreasonable", look up "Asian Parents" in the dictionary. Seriously.
Eventually I gave up because there is no use trying to make unreasonable people see reason. Be racist. Just don't infect me with your prejudices.
Number 3: The "Imma Stick To You Like Superglue And Tell You My Life Story" Guy/Girl
Let's make one thing clear. I value people's company. I really do. As I said before, young Cynthia knew all too well what it's like to be lonely to reject anyone's offer of friendship now. But sometimes there are boundaries and yes, there is such thing as being overexposed to people, especially when you had no plans to know that other person
so well.
You guys have probably had this issue before - the one where you have a conversation with someone but they seem to take it as something more. And because you don't want to come across as a bipolar bitch, you don't make any attempts to discourage them and all of a sudden, they're trying to make plans with you to meet up and do things and tell each other secrets and you're just like WOAH HOW DID WE GET HERE, I ONLY WANTED TO TALK ABOUT SEXY RICHARD ARMITAGE IN THE HOBBIT.
I actually don't know if this one is partially my fault, especially since I tend to lie or fake my interest even if a conversation is boring me to death. Maybe that's why people interpret it as something more?
*****
Alright, I think that's definitely enough ranting for one post. I could go on and on about the types of conversations that annoy me but in doing so, I'd probably be annoying you and then you'd go off and create Number 4: The Girl Who Annoys People By Talking About How Annoying People Are. Let's just leave it here.
