Communication skills are really important.

04 April 2008 @ 09:31 pm

Today, I accompanied a classmate to Plaza Singapura. I just realized that this was the first time I had stepped into that building in, let’s see… 3 years? It has changed A LOT. There is such a great selection of food to choose from like British Takeaway, which sells fried Mars Bars! Speaking of which, I haven’t tried, but they’re supposed to be really good, aren’t they? Pity they don’t have any comics and games stores…
Okay, I’m drifting off here. Back to the topic. When I left the building and was walking towards the MRT station, there was this strange man and woman who came up to me and my friend.

“Hi,” He said in Chinese. “I’m going to carry out a communication game (At least this is what I think he meant.) My Chinese isn’t good. You can speak Chinese, right?” He looked at our uniforms. He turned to my friend and said, “You look like you’re from China. Are you from China?”

My friend turned towards me with a strange look on her face and said, “Er… I’ve gotta go! My bus is here.” With that, she turned and ran off, leaving me behind to deal with the duo. I tried calling for my friend but she didn’t turn back. (Some friend, eh?)

The man smiled at me and asked me if she was from China. I said no, and then he asked to shake my hand. I did so, and he told me I was a girl who had her own mind and would not follow my friends. He said I would choose a good husband in the future because I was strong. I smiled a little sheepishly, not knowing how to react. This was weird.

He proceeded to talk about a whole lot of things I couldn’t understand, probably because he had holes and gaps in his teeth and his pronunciation just wasn’t right. All his words just flew past my ears, until he asked me a question and I had to get him to repeat it twice. It turned out that he asked me if I took drugs.

O.o

Of course I said no. This was ridiculous.

After more talking, he suddenly asked me, no wait, SAID I had to donate money to his cause. I was like, HUH? And I said I had no money with me. Then he said, “Oh it’s okay. $2 will be fine too.” I said, “I have no money.” and looked him in the eye. I think he got the hint. I apologized and he smiled and said “It’s okay. No need to apologize! Just keep smiling.” I walked off.

I couldn’t donate money, not because I had no money, but because I was completely unclear on what his motives were. And it was terrible the way he asked for money. He just said, “$4 or $6. You will donate, won’t you?” It was a very sudden thing. The desperation for money because he kept asking and bargaining for cash made me suspect that he was a conman or something, and also because the organization he was working for did not have any decent name cards or anything. It was really weird!

But what if he had had a decent motive? All that effort would have been wasted. There was no way he could have gotten his message across to anyone. I feel sorry for him. But then again, I wonder what he meant by “Playing a communications game”.

And the fact that irks me even more is the fact that he was bent on speaking Chinese when he couldn’t enunciate properly at all. The fact that I’m from a Chinese school does not mean I can’t speak English and that my Chinese is SUPERB. My English is way better than my Chinese, and he should have spoken in a language that people would understand instead of flaunting the fact that he’s “bilingual”.

Well, whatever it is, he really does need to fix his language skills. And maybe visit a dentist for some braces.


Current Location: At home
Current Mood: Numb
Current Music: "Kanashimini Makenaide" by Shimokawa Mikuni