I was carrying a pretty heavy luggage through London underground (metro) the other day and a guy, one of the fellow commuters, offered his hand to help. Nothing special, you might think. But it was special to me. It has never happened to me before. I mean never before a guy, complete stranger, would offer me help in such situation. I have not noticed this man-helping-man-in-transport-of-London pattern around too. What I normally see is when a guy offering help to another woman. I personally did offer such help too quite a few times, but it never occurred to me offering similar help to another guy. (Btw, I have not seen a reversed example: woman offering help to a man in similar matters. Oh, gender roles...)
When he offered his help, at first I was confused and thanked him by saying it’s OK, I can do it myself. But then he insisted, and I agreed... and it felt nice. Simple and nice. Thank you.
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7 comments:
Surprised you didn't ask for his telephone number... :)
I was too distracted :)
He surely must have fancied you. :)
But still nice.
I personally noticed that it is the english who never offer to help. Once I was dragging a huge suitcase and the three times I got offered help were all coming from foreigners in London. One Muslim girl with a scarf on, one Polish older lady and one Indian guy. :) Interesting pattern.
Mine was black guy, but probably British.
"Btw, I have not seen a reversed example: woman offering help to a man in similar matters. Oh, gender roles..."
-I have observed this as well ;)
Maybe it is because many men would be offended or refuse help from a woman... I have seen it happen on airplanes at least one or twice firsthand...
Good to know, Tzitzernak ;) Yes, possible reasons...
I am not surprised really. London although a large city but still retains the human factor. I have offered and I was offered help in some occassions. If I recall I was with my wife in most of the occassons so there cant be a talk about fancing. It is that some people cant ignore when a fellow person is suffering, carring heavy suitcase, looking lost or searching an address.
In some cases help was offered by natives, it is hard to tell if they were English, but probably were 2nd generation Irish or Scotish.
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