SMALL TALK AND FIRST SIMULATION.

HI EVERYBODY! 

Welcome back! Lets start  describing what we did on Friday (sorry its a little bit long).

After some technical problems, we started a small talk in groups of 3 or 4 and discussed about small talk: what we consider it, if having that kind of conversation is normal in our cultures or not and any other question that just came up in the moment.  As always, in my group, they expected Spanish people to talk a lot…which is true, but I must say that that doesn’t mean we are always talking with everybody…small talks in the bus stop with someone we don’t know are quite weird. However, it was interesting to compare how Finnish people only talk if they think the conversation is useful…cause then, I asked myself, what is a useful conversation?

 I love talking with my friends, with my family… and the most entertaining conversations are those where at the end, we are in a vicious circle….that happens a lot to me with one my best friends….we almost think the same with some small differences, and we are just talking about that differences, knowing that no one is going to change her mind…but that probably we will try again and again in few more days.  So is that conversation a totally waste of time for Finnish??

Anyway, I would like to say that I’m not really a girl who likes these small talks (I’m that kind of person who push the elevator close-doors bottom as fast as possible). In my opinion, normally, they are just something that we do because is what we learned to do, what is supposed to be correct. When we see our neighbours, we ask them about their families, their jobs, if they had fun in their last trip…. But do we really want to know it? I don’t even know their names!!

For me it is really uncomfortable when my neighbours ask me about my last trip or my studies, how do they know where I’m studying? Where I went? The answer is easy: because of their small talks with my parents!! I HATE IT, if I want them to know something about me, I will tell them….but obviously, I cannot get mad, it’s something cultural in my country, is what a small talk is.  (please don’t think I’m an introvert serious person…it’s absolutely the opposite I promise J)

About this I would like to conclude that I think saying hello/goodbye, holding the door, or giving a smile are awesome gestures that can transform someone´s bad day into a really good one.  SO LET’S TRY TO DO IT!!

Once we finished that small talk, we were discussing in the class about our impressions and what surprised us. Rapidly, we moved to answer which questions shouldn’t be asked. I think that about this topic there were (with some cultural differences) a general opinion about salaries. About this, now writing it I have just realised that in Spain is also rude to ask about political opinion….I don’t know if it’s the same for you.

Finally, we had our first negotiation where we were trying to decide the mark percentage for the evaluation. It was interesting how everything went around the blog.... My dear negotiators, I really liked it, we all were really respectful and friendly. In the las minutes of the class, we have firs simulation: I was a really good employer (the best ever, thanks to me the company is successful) looking for a higher salary among other advantages… It was a weird situation… I mean, It was so hard achieving my goal if I didn’t have a feedback, I didn’t know what to say to confirm m reasons to ask for it…. I had worked here really hard for many years…(what could have happen if the boss had said that’s not true? Or had just asked me how many years?). For me is easy to “fight” for that things were I think I’m right, I can negotiate if I’m really into the cause… but here I had nothing….however, at the end, I think I did pretty good, as apparently did all of us.

THATS ALL FOLKS!!