So, I went to a job interview on Thursday (well, I accidentally went to the same interview on Tuesday, too, but that's another story). The interview took place on the 17th storey of an office building. Since no way in Hell is anyone going to walk that high using stairs, I obviously took an elevator.
There were three elevators next to one another, and almost nobody else waiting for one but me, yet still the moment one elevator opened up so invitingly, it magically filled up with people. So there I was, the only woman in the elevator, surrounded by 5 dudes, in a tiny space going up. Luckilly some of them went off earlier than me and some after me, nobody on the same floor as I.
Some would call it ''Finnish Hell'', and I agree. Although I am not from Finland, but their southern neighbor across the sea, our cultures are extremely similar. Especially when it comes to personal space. (Maybe that's why we have a sea inbetween us, we appreciate and care about eachother enough but we also like our space).
I just did a search for ''Finnish Personal Space'' on Unsplash for great illustrative photos for this post, and all I got was the Moon, so that must, once again, prove the prior...
So there we were, an elevator full of people, in awkward silence, probably begging in our minds for the silence to stay, staring at our own feet with out weird little smirks. Thankfully nobody broke the Omertà.
Speaking of staring at our own feet, there's this anecdote about how to tell the difference between an introvert Estonian and an extrovert Estonian - in a conversation the first one stares at their own shoes, while the other one stares at the other person's shoes.
I must be the weird ambivert, the one inbetween. Switching between staring at my own shoes and other people's shoes.
Whose shoes do you stare at in conversations? How do you feel about being in an elevator with other people? How do people wait for the bus in your country? Oh, and do y'all have music playing in your elevators? (We don't, but I'm curious).
