Have you ever spoken to a stranger in the most unexpected place that kept you wondering all day – not why but how did he do that? Well, I just had one such experience.
I was browsing few books on marketing and entrepreneurs bio-graphies at Landmark bangalore and I heard someone making a remark about the books I was just looking at. He added, “I have recently started reading a few of them and I think they are excellent reads”. I nodded without paying any heed. I first decided to ignore him totally. Why would someone tell me (an absolute stranger) about his reading habits.
However, he went on. “So do you find these books interesting as well?” he asked. Now, what kind of a question was that. Who the hell was he. Maybe someone I had met earlier – no ways! I nodded again and added “kind of”. I was quite surprised on how somebody could just attempt to strike a conversation to a total stranger. Maybe he laid a bet with his friend that he would talk to some stranger and manage exchanging business cards. I suddenly decided to check on his background. I asked him what did he do for a living. He turned out to be a SAP India employee. I didn’t want to believe it for the first time he told me that.
By now I had picked up Seth Godin’s – All Marketers are Liars. He returned back the question to me. I told him I was a small time entrepreneur. Within next few questions he was already impressed with what I did. We exchanged cards and he left.
I couldn’t buy that story that someone could just strike up a 2 minutes conversation in the middle of an extremely busy store. I don’t think so I’ll have the zeal to do anything like that. I walked out of the store buying Seth Godin’s book and pondering on how extroverts do it.
This incident immediately reminded me on how one of my friend struck a conversation with a guy wearing FOSS(Free Open Source Software) t-shirt in bangalore and eventually hired him.
Probably next time you walk into a music store or a book store, try conversing to people who are standing right into the section that attracts you the most and see if you can strike a conversation. You may really have an interesting story to tell. It sounds a little too adventurous for me but I think I should someday give it a try.
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on Sunday, July 1st, 2007 at 11:35 am and is filed under People, Travel & Food.
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Nice one. People standing in the same section of the books that you like are likely to think your way. Good thought.
Well, I have picked up some conversations with strangers. I find them amazing. How each one of us carries a story within us. You get amazing perspectives on life.
You can get a great deal of information from total strangers. When I was on a flight to India last year, a German gentleman struck a conversation with me. He told me about how Germany was before re-unification and how US helped build West Germany after the war.
It was really nice to get his perspective of the division and unification of Germany…
It’s odd – but not really that much. Some people are more extroverted than others, and if you’re in a bookstore and see someone who seems interested in the same books as you, I suppose it seems natural to talk to them.
Every now and then I decide to talk to complete strangers if there’s something about them that intrigues me, or if I have the same breed of dog they do, or if they’re wearing a neat t-shirt. I guess it just depends.