The Etiquette of Staring

If a person is around me for any longer than ten minutes they will most likely get stared at. Usually this is unintentional. I zone out, taking wild rides on trains of thought which usually stop by the ‘most recent TV show I watched’, ‘that cloud looks like a ______’ and ‘Harry Potter plot inconsistency’ stations before I snap out of it and realise that the blank space I was staring at is now occupied by a Someone. The same Someone who is now staring back at me, assessing what sort of danger they might be in. I can’t help it if my ‘Vague Face’ looks like other people’s ‘Murder Face’.

Staring seems to make people uncomfortable. Which puts an interesting spin on staring contest enthusiasts.

I’m not brilliant at eye contact, though I’m not entirely sure why. Maybe it’s because it gives people the opportunity to extract my soul like some kind of occular Dementor, though I think it’s more likely due to the confusing etiquette surrounding when it is appropriate to look someone in the eye.

Not having a good balance in eye contact screws you up in multiple areas:

Honesty: too much, and you seem like you’re trying too hard and are thus covering up a lie. Too little, and you are shifty, and clearly have something to hide.

Relationships: look too long, and they will know you’re interested. Don’t look at all and it seems like you’re avoiding them. Either because you are interested, or because you are not interested. Helpful.

Study: looking up during an exam DEFINITELY MEANS PEOPLE THINK YOU ARE CHEATING. So you don’t look up at all which makes picking up dropped pens or responding to unexpected noises difficult and confusing. This feeds in to honesty, so not looking also means PEOPLE THINK YOU ARE TRYING TO HIDE THE FACT YOU ARE CHEATING. Because exams didn’t already make me neurotic enough.

Conversations: looking too much means you are either super interested or zoning out. People will always assume it is the one it isn’t which leads to more of the same. Not looking at all or minimal looking means you aren't interested and people get all kinds of affronted. Or don't notice and keep going, again leading to more of the same. Generally leads to doom spirals.

Getting caught in a stare usually goes one of four ways.

In the first, you know they can see your line of vision and you both get trapped in the stare net. Neither wants to look away, and you both try and scope out the other. Eventually you look away at the same time and act like the whole thing never happened. An awkward laugh may be implemented at this point. Usually one for strangers.

The second is the misdirection stare. They catch you, so you look over their shoulder and try to convince them you were looking at some fascinating thing there. Murphy’s Law dictates that the only thing behind them will be either something really bland like a plastic chair, or something that it is socially worse for you to be staring at. Like a ‘breasts of the day’ calendar.

Third is the compromise for eye strain stare. Here you make eye contact, then pretend to look away whilst monitoring the situation from the corner of your eye. They know you are still looking, but in order to know this, they have to be looking too. Neither of you wants to admit to being Starer 0, so you both pretend that no one is looking at anyone.

Finally there is the machine gun stare. You get caught staring. You look away. Look up again to see if they are still looking. They are. They look down. Then back up. You see this and look down again. Continues for uncomfortably long and makes you think of the Old Spice ad. Then you picture the other person in a towel and everything gets horrifying as you question what sort of person you are. Usually one of you has to leave in order to end the madness.

I’m not sure what the solution to any of these is really. You could always yell “THIS IS SPARTA” and sprint away, but whilst pop-culturetastic, I don’t know if that would alleviate the awkwardness much.

Oh well. Here's looking at you kid.

Tramsformation

I don’t do well on public transport. I do especially badly on the single tram that Adelaide possesses. I’m not sure if it is the combination of a severe lack of control of anything ever coupled with extreme close proximity with many people, but even just thinking about setting foot on that demon caterpillar of terribly planned awfulness fills me with foreboding.

It hasn’t always been this way. About ten years ago the tram was maroon, squishy and arrived when it said it would. The seats weren’t arranged by a deranged person deprived of Lego as a child, instead they were most likely imagined by someone with some semblance of skill and imagination, as when the tram changed direction at the end of a trip, the conductor would merely walk down the aisle flipping the backs to the other side, and voila! All seats were now facing the other way.

The track was also shorter, ending before the city, thus avoiding the mass influx of people who were too lazy to walk the 800 metres from Chinatown into the main CBD (sometimes this was me, but back in the day there was a bus for that).

Now, track length, passenger number and inefficiency has increased resulting in a useless, expensive piece of WHY?! which has not only messed with traffic in the city, but breaks down more regularly than me watching ‘Titanic’, and even factoring in two trams as a buffer, still involves an individual embarking on a game of punctuality Russian roulette.

The seating also encourages strange social interaction. At the very front and back of the tram are the most highly prized seats. Tucked against a wall, you can hide yourself in a corner and hold the handy yellow bar which seems to serve no particular purpose other than to steady yourself in a vain attempt to avoid violently smacking your head against the front of the tram when the driver inevitably makes sudden stops to avoid hitting death-wish holding pedestrians. Behind this are the “blocks of four” which usually result in either four strangers awkwardly playing footsies, or two people trying valiantly to not stare at the overly affectionate couple sitting opposite. Sometimes the result is small-talk, or, as I once witnessed, deals to exchange cigarettes for shower time. Behind this are the guilt seats. Here you can look back at all the people standing, and enter into the unanswerable struggle of whether or not you should give up your spot. That woman isn’t pregnant, and she isn’t decisively elderly. However she’s on the threshold, so you stand to offer your seat. She gets offended, declines, and whilst you are still standing, a surly teenager plops into your place. Winning times.

Individual awesome experiences I’ve had include a woman sitting next to me filing her nails directly onto my bag, and being cornered by a woman I became eventually convinced was planning to kill and eat me. Possibly not in that order.

She didn’t.

I just don’t understand how something that is trapped on a single line, with its very own traffic lights and boom gates is capable of being so consistently infuriating, or how the injection of money and time has resulted in the deterioration of a service. Adelaide Metro: I mind this gap.