Overheard in London

[baratron]

I overheard the most thought-provoking conversation today. This woman went up to a man who was working behind one of the market stalls in Camden Market and asked him if he was from some specific part of Nigeria

Comments

[barakta]

When I lived and taught English to students in Romania I was staying mostly in a city 20km from the Hungarian border which was Hungarian territory until recentlyish. There are mini towns which still transact almost entirely in Hungarian. All the families I stayed with her Hungarian-Romanians speaking Hungarian at home and Romanian outside the home.

After about 2-3 months and talking to students about their backgrounds and culture and history I realised I could look around a room of young people and make a fair stab at identifying those with Hungarian background (common) those from central and South Romania (their faces had a different shape entirely longer and narrower) and then people with Serbian ancestry (they had very looong faces, black hair and very dark eyes). The Hungarians tended to have rounder almost East-Asianish heartshaped faces. I was always immediately obviously a foreigner, I could see people trying to work out where I was from. They also thought I was ill all the time cos I'm much paler skinned than most folk who had quite olivey complexions. I had to explain I'm of Scottish origins, palefaced is normal for us.

I guess the Nigerian thing is a bit like picking up tiny social and physical cues. I can tell you which part of Stockport someone is from (or used to be able to) by their accent. I knew kingginger was from where he said he was on the phone before we met IRL (we met on Internet) cos he had a twang in his accent of the area his parents lived on top of the Americanish twang he had from living overseas with international communities so long.

I suspect we can't even articulate many of the things we can detect about others cos it is all social markers.