#3 Not Talking about the Weather

You all know the scene. You walk into work, see the receptionist who gives you a friendly smile, which necessitates a verbal response, so you say "man, it's cold" with a smile. OR you're small talking with strangers at a party, conversation starts to get a little dry so someone says, "can you believe how much it's rained lately?" OR you're standing on the train and start to feel chatty, so the easiest way to strike up a conversation with the guy next to you is, "can you believe how hot it is today?". Welcome to the Midwest.

Having both grown up in the Midwest, Neil and I know that we can always rely on the faithful "how's the weather?" conversation filler. What's great, is that it's not just mindless "filler", because it really is a legitimately interesting topic, because the weather is so rarely the same two days in a row. Monday could bring 50 degrees, partly cloudy. Tuesday is 20 degrees, sunny. Wednesday is 31/32 degrees and freezing rain. But, not in Chennai.

I realized before me moved here that we would have to re-learn how to "small talk", but I wasn't totally sure what was and was not going to work. After a couple of friendly "it's hot" comments, I quickly realized that talking about the weather was one area of small talk that didn't survive the plane ride. Imagine if all of your conversation fillers suddenly come back void and you realize that you have NO CLUE how to start, end or fill friendly conversation. That's what happened to me. It was a little unnerving at first, until I realized that the reason weather isn't a great topic to talk about in Chennai is because IT NEVER CHANGES! There are definitely differences in the seasons, but day to day you can absolutely count on the weather being between 30-34 degrees celsius and sunny. Go ahead, google it.

So, now I'm happy that I've lost a conversation filler because I've gained consistency in an area of my life that was NEVER consistent before: the weather. Plus, I've figured out the perfect conversation filler to go in it's place: my language faux-paus.