Smiling at Strangers

Recently, I did sort of an experiment. At first, it wasn’t at all determined to be one. I was just having a nice day at university and for some reason, I don’t even remember it, I was feeling very happy. So, while walking to town to do some errands, I smiled at everyone I met without even thinking about it. I just felt happy and I wanted to share this happiness. But after a short time I realized that most people don’t even look at you while crossing your way. The majority of people were looking at the pavement or in some other direction. Some looked at me, but they seemed to think I was crazy, smiling at strangers.

I started to think about it and I am surprised at how seldom people make eye contact and how rarely they give you a smile.

Of course, there were some exceptions. A lot of men did actually make eye contact and when they did they smiled back. I met someone who seemed to be in a very good mood, too. We were smiling at one another and I could honestly feel his happiness and friendliness and this made me even happier. 

I smiled then more often at strangers, but only on days I felt happy, because I wanted to give a genuine smile to others. On top of that, when I am happy, I can’t help but smile, so it was just a natural thing to do. What I have also recognized is that women were hardly ever looking at me and if they did, they looked away the next second. I think there was just one woman who was smiling back. I couldn’t make out any reasons for that yet. Maybe most men are more of an extrovert sort than women. But I hate to generalize that. Anyway, it wasn’t a representative study or something like that, but it is what I have experienced and I smiled at a lot of people, regardless of which age or gender.

I wonder if this is different in other countries or whether it would have been different if I wasn’t a woman.  Maybe other women tend to smile at men more often. Furthermore, it also depends on the cultural background. At university, we had a workshop on intercultural communication and the teacher, a woman from England who has already been in several countries to do those workshops, told us that when she came to Germany for the first time, she thought that Germans were very unfriendly because they hardly ever smiled at strangers. So this seems to be different in Great Britain and also in the US, I think. In contrast, there was also a Russian girl and she told us she thought Germans were the friendliest people she has ever met, smiling all the time. She explained that it is very uncommon in Russia to smile at others when you don’t know them, but that doesn’t mean at all that they are unfriendly. It is just something you usually only share with close friends.

I thought this to be quite interesting because I have never realized these facts before.

So maybe I too was walking self-absorbed and didn’t recognize other people’s smiles. I think most people here are absorbed in thought and therefore they don’t really recognize what happens around them. Moreover, there can be many reasons. Maybe they were having a bad day and thus it is just natural that they don’t smile at complete strangers.


However, some people even seem to get excited about receiving a little smile without any apparent reason. I enjoy these moments very much, seeing that you can make someone happy, just by smiling.

Happiness is something that always grows when it is shared. And a smile is the easiest way to share it.
 

In any case, a warm and genuine smile is such a valuable thing.

Thank you for reading my posts and for leaving such wonderful comments and opinions on this blog, I am sending you all a smile, although you can’t see it, but it is indeed an honest one. :)