Sometimes we hear, but we don't listen...

Humans, homo sapiens, people. Like the many ways we can call ourselves, there is an equally numerous number of ways we humans can react to or perceive any given situation. It never fails to amuse/irritate (depending on the situation) me how some people can perceive/react to a situation in radically different ways from what would be the norm. Of course, sometimes its a simple misunderstanding. But at the end of the day, they have the right to do whatever they please, just like I have the right to look at them with a raised eyebrow...

Anyway, one such incident occurred today over lunch with my IA mates. We were having lunch at a hawker centre near our workplace, when the following took place...

Note: The following conversation tookplace in Mandarin. But until I figure out how to get Chinese characters displayed in html, you guys will have to make do with my (dubious) translation skills.

My friend had ordered chicken rice and when the auntie serving his food came, he asked, "Auntie, do you have dark soya sauce?"

"You want dark soya ah? Here got!" she said, pointing to the mixture of soya sauce, sesame seed oil and chicken oils that forms the usual sauce of the chicken meat. In reaction to this, we all stared at plate of chicken, trying hard to figure out where the dark soya sauce is.

After, what must have been about 30 seconds of silence (and disbelief), my friend said, "Never mind Auntie, I will walk over to your stall and get the dark soya sauce myself..."

Now, of course, we found her answer amusing (whether you do or not depends on how good a story teller I am...). But at the end of the day, it could've been a simple misunderstanding, or it could be that the auntie was trying to be GL (pardon the bad language) and lazy. In any case, this incident reminded me of how easily miscommunication could happen, and why we should always watch what we say...

I think I won't post any news articles today (this post is long enough). There really wasn't anything that I found that interesting, so I guess I'll take a break. ;)