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Originally Posted by Pip
How do you hold up doors for others in Americaland?!? In Sweden we usually position ourselves so that it's obvious you expect the next person to "catch" the door, then when that person has "caught" it, you let go and move on, so you hold the door for the one after you - regardless of gender - and that's it. It's like a relay race, but with a door. Some idiots don't participate, but generally I think Swedes are pretty good at holding doors for eachother, and particularly at my university. Maybe that's because the main building mostly concists of corridors full of doors. *shrugs*
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hahaha, that's exactly what i do. maybe it's just that americans are much more into niceties like "thank you" and the ever-present totally vapid "how are you?" (as if they even want to know if you're miserable) and pointless small talk in general, and we expect a higher level of service from places like restaurants, so i guess some of that carries over into day to day life. americans are just very awkward with silences, they always feel it has to be filled and that includes the moment of someone holding the door i guess.
myself, Ive never really expected a higher level of service from other people than what I'm getting. i find the whole small talk with strangers thing extremely awkward, and this is just a minimalist form of small talk. it doesn't have to be constantly acknowledged precisely because it is COMMON courtesy. (I suppose for certain definitions of common courtesy the thanking could be included, but not mine ;p)
i'll add that i'm sure there are "courtesy" situations where i would have acted differently in hindsight, but when its actually happening i often have this debilitating combination of anxiety and social awkwardness that causes me to do nothing or the wrong thing because i just don't know what is the right thing to do at the time. speaking for all of us, don't take it personally, i don't mean any disrespect, and i'd love to be a social butterfly managing all such situations smooth as butter, but unfortunately we are not all wired that way regardless of the lofty expectations of american society.