So @fightingfish and I came up with this discussion about liminal spaces in Malaysia, like. And we kind of realized a few things:
Unlike in the US, hypermarkets like Tesco and Giant aren’t exactly liminal spaces, because the employees stamp their own identity and personality in these spaces. Maybe in some poorly-visited areas of the hypermarket? But not at the cash areas, the produce areas, or that serve foods.
That being said, probably some hardware large hardware stores, some art supplies stores used for wedding supplies.
University Malaya Medical Centre, specifically some corridors.
Not mosques, especially some mosques like Masjid Bulat Seksyen 14 have given me the opposite of liminality. But suraus, the Muslim equivalent of chapels, yes. Unless that surau is made a community center, where there’s daycare, or teaching.
Large parts of schools during school holidays, except the places where they do extracurricular activities.
Large parts of Kuala Lumpur during Chinese New Year, and to be fair, Hari Raya
😂
(less of this these days, though, because we’re seeing people who’ve lived and consider Kuala Lumpur their home for generations).
Oil palm plantations, some service roads, or, basically places where you’d go if you were a horny couple and didn’t have a place to have sex.
Highway stops and R&Rs, almost with no exception. Yeah, even the large ones like the Restoran Jejantas.
Overhead pedestrian crossings, especially across train tracks.
Most of Publika outside of the heavily trafficked areas and the art installations.
Some public parks (an example would have been parks like Taman Aman. Interestingly enough, Taman Jaya during the time Pokémon Go actually had its liminality banished due to the large numbers of people trooping through the park to get a Pikachu, but… I don’t know? It certainly felt surreal gaming there).
Old rural train stations (a famous example would have been depicted in Lat’s Mat Som, i.e. Stesen Keretapi Tanjung Malim).
Actually, that last example is instructive, in which that scene, the punks who were with Mat Som called the train stop itself “tempat jin bertandang” (i.e. the place where spirits dwell / hang out).
schools in major exam season, where everything is open but only the nerds show up to study together.
libraries. sad but especially true for malaysia.
old offices where everything smells like paper and nothing has been digitized.
actually anywhere that has the smell of old paper.
i’m gonna argue that the whole universiti malaya campus is a liminal space. it feels trapped in the 90s.
train stations. i get this feeling especially for the new LRT extension stations that just opened, and train stations at the end of the line. Putra Heights is liminal like hella.
all bus stops and bus stations.
highways are, by definition, liminal spaces. plus everything feels slightly unreal when whizzing at 120km/h along the lebuhraya utara-selatan.
stores where everything is sold in bulk.
the underground tunnel between platforms at masjid jamek.
dataran merdeka!!! it just feels weird to have that much open space that isn’t designated for sports.
i remember during protests and at the height of the pokemon go craze, people swarmed dataran merdeka and the street next to it after sundown. the road was closed to cars, so kids rode their bikes and played in the middle of the street. there was music. i felt like i’d stepped into an upside-down version of this world.
the hallway of a shopping mall when you exit a cinema.
jalan gasing, because of the sheer number of places of worship (especially churches) along this road. last weekend the road got almost completely shut down because vaisakhi, puthandu, vishu, songkran, and holy week all happened at the same time.
amcorp mall
so like i said in my last reblog, i tried to have a think. everyone’s got good suggestions, but im gonna give a go. i keep being confused about if we’re talking about old places or just places where reality just took a pause:
– the underground tunnel system that defines kompleks dayabumi.
– the corridors of wisma pkns.
– bangunan mara in kl, esp level 2. going thru the maze of tailors in the tailors’ plaza is a trip.
– very specifically, the R&Rs along the PLUS highway approaching the central mountain range before 10am on a cold morning.
– any jalan kampung in between the villages/settlements especially around dusk or when the sun has slipped past its zenith.
– most if not all of our airports that got built with the klia aesthetic. off the top of my head: kuching, kk and penang. kt not so much, kota bharu definitely not, i don’t remember much of the rest.
– the area in central jb that leads towards the tebrau strait/sea. um, the road where that hipster chaiwalla cafe is basically, at 9pm onwards. NOT the section with the indian shops XD those are lively as heck.
– the amusement park at genting highlands when it’s heavy with mist and still raining.
– bukit tinggi in the same weather. the tacky buildings makes it even more surreal.
– uitm main tower building’s corridors esp now that they’ve moved out the faculties occupying the space.
– starhill tbh esp the floor where ytl’s art space starts.
– the batu feringgi beach at dawn before everyone wakes up.
Oscar Wilde inspired Look Book for Alexander McQueen – Autumn/Winter 2017 Menswear Collection – designer: Sarah Burton – photographer: Ethan James Green – stylist: Alister Mackie – art direction: M/M Paris – hair: Matt Mulhall – makeup: Miranda Joyce – casting director: Jess Hallett – models: Filip Roseen, Kalam Horlick, Myles Dominique, Safari & Tsubasa – location: London
Last year I did a few write-ups and drawings about some lady fighters from history who fought openly as their gender (there are plenty of disguised-as-a-man soldiers and plenty of trans soldiers, but those are outside the scope of this series). This is by no means an exhaustive list; there were plenty of great figures that my schedule didn’t permit me to tackle (at least not yet). But as Women’s History Month gets started tomorrow, I thought y’all might enjoy reading about some of history’s toughest broads.
Fun fact: Tenochtitlan fell in 1521. From 1603 onwards, large numbers of honest-to-god fricking Japanese Samurai came to Mexico from Japan to work as guardsmen and mercenaries.
Ergo, it would be 100% historically accurate to write a story starring a quartet consisting of the child or grandchild of Aztec Noblemen, an escaped African slave, a Spanish Jew fleeing the Inquisition (which was relaxed in Mexico in 1606, for a time) and a Katana-wielding Samurai in Colonial Mexico.
Also a whole bunch of Chinese Characters BECAUSE MEXICO CITY HAD A CHINATOWN WITHIN TEN YEARS OF THE FALL OF THE AZTEC EMPIRE.
Look, I don’t believe in God, but I will not disrespect the Good Gentlemen of the Hills. That’s just common sense.
Between this and the Icelanders with their elves I do not understand what is going on above the 50th parallel.
My general rule of thumb: you don’t have to believe in everything, but don’t fuck with it, just in case.
^^^ that part
This is truer than true. Especially the Irish part.
Let me tell you what I know about this after living here for nearly thirty years.
This is a modern European country, the home of hot net startups, of Internet giants and (in some places, some very few places) the fastest broadband on Earth. People here live in this century, HARD.
Yet they get nervous about walking up that one hill close to their home after dark, because, you know… stuff happens there.
I know this because Peter and I live next to One Of Those Hills. There are people in our locality who wouldn’t go up our tiny country road on a dark night for love or money. What they make of us being so close to it for so long without harm coming to us, I have no idea. For all I know, it’s ascribed to us being writers (i.e. sort of bards) or mad folk (also in some kind of positive relationship with the Dangerous Side: don’t forget that the root word of “silly”, which used to be English for “crazy”, is the Old English _saelig_, “holy”…) or otherwise somehow weirdly exempt.
And you know what? I’m never going to ask. Because one does not discuss such things. Lest people from outside get the wrong idea about us, about normal modern Irish people living in normal modern Ireland.
You hear about this in whispers, though, in the pub, late at night, when all the tourists have gone to bed or gone away and no one but the locals are around. That hill. That curve in the road. That cold feeling you get in that one place. There is a deep understanding that there is something here older than us, that doesn’t care about us particularly, that (when we obtrude on it) is as willing to kick us in the slats as to let us pass by unmolested.
So you greet the magpies, singly or otherwise. You let stones in the middle of fields be. You apologize to the hawthorn bush when you’re pruning it. If you see something peculiar that cannot be otherwise explained, you are polite to it and pass onward about your business without further comment. And you don’t go on about it afterwards. Because it’s… unwise. Not that you personally know any examples of people who’ve screwed it up, of course. But you don’t meddle, and you learn when to look the other way, not to see, not to hear. Some things have just been here (for various values of “here” and various values of “been”) a lot longer than you have, and will be here still after you’re gone. That’s the way of it. When you hear the story about the idiots who for a prank chainsawed the centuries-old fairy tree a couple of counties over, you say – if asked by a neighbor – exactly what they’re probably thinking: “Poor fuckers. They’re doomed.” And if asked by anybody else you shake your head and say something anodyne about Kids These Days. (While thinking DOOMED all over again, because there are some particularly self-destructive ways to increase entropy.)
Meanwhile, in Iceland: the county council that carelessly knocked a known elf rock off a hillside when repairing a road has had to go dig the rock up from where it got buried during construction, because that road has had the most impossible damn stuff happen to it since that you ever heard of. Doubtless some nice person (maybe they’ll send out for the Priest of Thor or some such) will come along and do a little propitiatory sacrifice of some kind to the alfar, belatedly begging their pardon for the inconvenience.
They’re building the alfar a new temple, too.
Atlantic islands. Faerie: we haz it.
The Southwest is like this in some ways. You don’t go traveling along the highways at night with an empty car seat. Because an empty car seat is an invitation. You stick your luggage, your laptop bag, whatever you got in that seat. Else something best left undiscussed and unnamed (because to discuss it by name is to go ‘AY WE’RE TALKING BOUT YA WE’RE HERE AND ALSO IGNORANT OF WHAT YOU’RE CAPABLE OF’ at the top of your damn lungs at them) will jump in to the car, after which you’re gonna have a bad time.
If you’re out in the woods, you keep constant, consistent count of your party and make sure you know everyone well enough that you can ID them by face alone, lest something imitating a person get at you. They like to insert themselves in the party and just observe before they strike. It’s a game to them. In general you don’t fuck with the weird, you ignore the lights in the sky (no, this isn’t a god damn night vale reference, yes I’m serious) and the woods, you lock up at night and you don’t answer the door for love or money. Whatever or whoever’s knocking ain’t your buddy.
^ So much good advice in this post right here
I live in the south and… you just… don’t go into the woods or fields at night.
Don’t go near big trees in the night
If you live on a farm, don’t look outside the windows at night
I have broken all these rules.
I’ve seen some shit.
If it sounds like your mom, but you didn’t realize your mom is home…. it’s not your mom. Promise.
One walked onto the porch once. Wasn’t fun. But they’re not super keen on guns. Typically bolt when they see one.
You think it’s the neighbor kids.
It’s not the neighbor kids.
Might sound like coyotes but you never really /see/ the coyotes but then wow that one cow was reaaaaaally fucked up this morning. The next night when you hear another one screaming you just turn the tv up a little more. Maybe fire a gun in the air but you don’t go after it. If it is coyotes then it’s probably a pack and you seriously don’t want to fuck with that and if it’s the other thing you seriously REALLY don’t want to fuck with that.
So in the south, especially near the mountains, you just go straight from your car to inside your house, draw your curtains and watch tv.
If you see lights in the fields just fucking leave it alone.
Eyes forward. Don’t be fucking stupid. Mind your own business. Call your neighbors and tell them to bring the cats in. There’s coyotes out. Some of them know. Most of them don’t.
Other than that everything’s a ghost and they died in the civil war. Literally all of everything else is just the civil war. We used to smell old perfume and pipe tobacco in the weeks leading up to the battle anniversaries.
Shit’s wild and I sound fucking crazy but I swear to god it’s true.
Every time this post comes around, it’s my favorite to open up the notes and read the stories. Probably shouldn’t have since I’m sleeping alone tonight, but you know, it’s fine. 😂
Austrian girl here who has lived in Ireland for 5+ years. This shit is LEGIT. I’ve seen it with my own two Catholic eyes.
Sure, visit during the day. That’s alright as long as you’re respectful. But you couldn’t PAY ME ENOUGH to go there at night. These are also the last places where you wanna start littering.
I grew up in southwest Pennsylvania which is a weird mixture of American cultures and environments. I was in the heavily forested mountains (northern Appalachia) but had lots and lots of corn fields and cow pastures. Like the Smoky Mountains and fields of Kansas combined. And being so cut off from a lot of the world, we had our fair share of ghost stories.
We had ‘witches’ in the mountains (more like ghost-women who will snatch you up by making you wander in a daze around the forest like the Blair Witch before killing you or letting you back out into society but you’re… different). Or devils in springs or abandoned wells (don’t look too long into one or something will follow you).
But we also had the cornfield demons. I’ve witnessed this many times. You’ll be in the passenger seat looking out the window and see red glowing eyes in the cornfield. No light shining in that direction. Just two red dots a few inches apart faintly glowing in a pitch black cornfield. They’re not the glow of deer eyes in the headlights. More like the embers of a dying fire. Sometimes, as you drive away, you’ll look out the back window or side mirror and you can see the eyes have moved to the edge of the corn field, still watching you. If you bring it up with the driver, they’ll call you paranoid, but grip the wheel a bit tighter and driver a little faster.
I was walking to a friend’s house one night. It was about 20 minutes down a dirt road with forest on one side and a cornfield on the other. I’ve walked past it many times and wasn’t really concerned. My main worry was coming across a skunk or porcupine. I didn’t have a flashlight because the moonlight was bright enough and I knew the walk really well. Then I saw the eyes. I immediately averted mine (because for some reason that’s how to not annoy it) but they kept wandering back. They were still there, watching. I heard rustling and saw the eyes come closer and I took off running. I got to my friends without a scratch, but I was terrified. I mentioned it to my friend and that’s when I found out it was A Thing. Her parents agreed and shared their stories. I brought it up more and almost everyone knew what I was talking about. It was a phenomenon a lot of folks around town experienced but never mentioned. To this day, I don’t linger around poorly light cornfields at night.
Faeries and Wee Folk and Liminal Spaces, oh myyyy…
I just…yes. This. All of this. And then some.
You don’t have to understand it. You don’t have to believe in it.
But if you know what’s good for you, DON’T FUCK WITH IT.
Wait tho, if this is part of the American gestalt, then why is it that five-fifteen minutes into every horror film I’m turning and telling whoever I’m watching with, “So these idiots have a fucking death-wish huh? What’s wrong with modern westerners?”
@whitmans-kiss
I walked into a house once on a tour, got the most horrific feeling, lost my shit and left. Unfortunately at the time I was 10-ish and the troop leader was really annoyed.
But that place just felt wrong on every possible level.
I am VERY science-minded. I am pretty aggressively agnostic (I don’t just not know if there’s a god-like being or not, I don’t think anyone else can know.)
But… I think that not-knowing extends to a lot of things, and I know enough about science to know that there’s a lot of shit we haven’t begun to understand, and I have been in some really weird situations in my life just listening to the little voice that says, “Don’t go there” or “Get home right now”.
That voice doesn’t speak up often, but listening is a priority.
Natalie Portman being confused by the fact that you have to say “hi” to someone before starting a conversation in France got me like ?????
“I feel there’s a lot of rules of politeness and codes of behavior there you have to follow. […] A friend of mine taught me that when you go in some place you have to say “bonjour” before you say anything else, then you have to wait two seconds before you say something else. So if you go into a store you can’t be like “do you have this in another size,” or they’ll think you’re super rude and then they’ll be rude to you.” [X]
So that’s it guys. French are not rude, we just don’t like it when people don’t say “Hello” or “Hi” when they start a conversation.
Don’t everyone say “Hi” before they ask something to someone? What’s next? Saying please is also a french thing or others countries does that too?
Canada is similar. We say sorry and please. The Hello thing seems strange, but it actually makes sense.
Bro, this threw me for a loop when I moved up north. Like in the southern United States you say “Hi, how are you?” And then make a few seconds of small talk before you ask your question or order your food and when I went to Connecticut they were like “What do you want?” Without any hello or anything. In other places they just STARE at you waiting on you to place your order and gtfo.
I laid my hand over my chest the first time, and the only way to describe my look was “aghast” before I said “Good lord!” My husband said it’s the most southern thing he’s seen me do. He thought it was hilarious. But…. Like??? That’s rude as fuck??????? Don’t y’all say say “Hello” before throwing your demands at someone??
maybe this is why everyone thinks new yorkers are rude
this is absolutely why ppl think new englanders r rude. no one has any fucking manners
african culture, at least in ghana, demands you greet a person before you ask them something. if youre in an open market they may even ignore you if you dont.
We do this in Australia as well. If you just started straight off saying “yeah I want XXXX” we’d think you’re rude as all fuck. You say hi, then make your request. It’s basic acknowledgement of the other person as a person rather than some random request-filling machine.
Huh. Speaking as a New Englander, I usually go with “Excuse me,” but sometimes “hi” or “hey,” but with no pause – it’ll be, “Excuse me, hi, I was looking for X?” From my POV, it seems rude to get too chatty and waste some stranger’s time; I assume they have better things to do than make small talk with me, so I just get my request out there so they can answer me and get back to whatever needs doing. I always thank folks for their help afterwards, if that helps?
(The rules of etiquette are strange. People say New Englanders are rude and cold, but once during an unexpected snowstorm here in Seattle, my car got stuck and I was standing by the side of the road at a busy intersection in the snow for half an hour waiting for my housemate to come pick me up, and not a single person stopped. Back in Massachusetts, every other car on the road would’ve been pulling up to check to see if I was okay, if my phone was working, did I need a lift, etc.)
No but this was the first thing my cousin told me in France? you never ever ever start a conversation with anyone, not even like “Nice weather today, huh?” without saying Bonjour first. You HAVE to greet them or, just like Ghana, they’ll ignore the shit out of you, you rude little fucker
(And “excuse me” or “pardon me” doesn’t cut it. you still have to open with bonjour)
[and I can’t speak for New England but coming from Chicago and then moving Out West where the culture is VERY influenced by the South and DETERMINED to think of themselves as small town folk… I HATE when I have to make small talk before ordering food??? Like, if it’s a coffee shop that’s pretty much empty I’ll chit chat for a few seconds, but I’m still not going to make inane conversation about the weather unless the weather is extreme.
In a big city it is rude as fuck to waste my time making small talk with me when we are not even friends or neighbors??? I am here to get shit done. There are four other people in line behind me, and I don’t want to waste their time. I am here, I HAVE MY ORDER ALREADY DECIDED BY THE TIME I GET TO THE FRONT BECAUSE I AM NOT A CAVE WOMAN, and I am being polite by saying both Please and Thank You and not wasting other people’s daylight.]
I live in a small northern city, and I feel it would be rude to engage someone in more than maaaaaybe a sentence of small talk before placing my order. In addition to feeling I was wasting their time, I’d feel like I was demanding emotional labour (small-talk is emotional labour for *me*) that they weren’t being paid to give.
so bizarre. New Yorker here. Saying hi, how are you, etc before these kinds of commercial interactions is what’s rude to me – because ffs, there are people in line behind you, we have lives, move it along. It’s really just a dramatic cultural difference – but borne of a real practical necessity.
Oh my god saying ‘hi’ takes less than A SINGLE SECOND YOU ARE NOT WASTING ANYBODY’S TIME
In Spain you have to say hello to people before you talk to them even people who work in retail deserve that bare minimum courtesy hello??
Transplanted New Yorker here, and the feeling here is: people who work in retail deserve the bare minimum courtesy you would afford anyone else, which is to not waste their time. You maybe say a half-second “hi” and/or possibly “excuse me” to be sure you have their attention, then you get to the point as quickly and concisely as possible. You don’t wait to get a “hi” back, you probably don’t ask “how are you”, you definitely don’t talk about the weather. You smile and keep your tone of voice courteous-to-friendly, you say please, you thank them when you’re done, and you do. not. waste. their. time.
Except ”time” is really only shorthand for the concept: you don’t intrude on their lives more than you have to. NY is a very very crowded city which allows for very little personal space, so New Yorkers have developed a form of courtesy that involves minimizing our unavoidable intrusions on each other. Which is why we hold doors without making eye contact, and why we tend to feel that in any interaction with a stranger, it’s actively rude to do anything but get to the point immediately.
I’ve had long talks with people about how “polite” in NYC/NJ/New England and polite in the Midwest are very, VERY different, and this thread nails it. The Midwest (and the South, and apparently France) are very hung up on the forms of politeness, including the fake caring about other people’s days and making smalltalk. NYC-folk, instead, are focused on the effects for politeness. Am I intruding on your day? How can I make this as efficient as possible so that you can do what you want/need to be doing?
The big example I use is a tourist with a map. If you stop in the middle of the sidewalk in NYC, people get annoyed and sometimes angry (I’ve seen this happen at the top of an escalator in Penn Station…) but if you pull out of the way, someone who has a moment will come and offer to help you, generally fairly quickly.
This is really interesting commentary on politeness.
I’m from England, and from a big city, and I’d say that we fall on the “effects” of politeness scale. We’d generally say “Excuse me” or “Hi” to people and go straight into the question. We don’t really do small talk unless you end up waiting around for something. And of course you say please and thank you and smile and are generally courteous throughout the following conversation.
… there should be a website for people to describe politeness etiquette in their local areas. I’m off to New Orleans soon and I’d really like to know the etiquette over there before I go…
*cribs ideas for worldbuilding*
I’m from england too, small town/country side, and you always open with “hi, can i get x?” the idea of opening with “how are you” is… weird. so weird. they are a stranger. Unless you’re starting a longer interaction, like sitting down with an estate agent, or knocking on someone’s door for something, and even then it would be a “Ms X? Hi, I’m Y, nice to meet you. so I’m looking for…” the maximum interaction would be a “nice to meet you”. otherwise you’re wasting everyone’s time. because they don’t care and neither do you. a polite “ excuse me, sorry, hi, i was wondering if” is the maximum preamble you need.
this is useful info tho. it explains a lot about some interactions I’ve had.
Eh les frenchies, look what just come back to us, with two wonderful New Yorker Comment on how saying “bonjour” is a huge waist of time.
love it.
Interesting chat on politeness!
I can see both sides of this (having lived in New York City, different parts of France, and currently living in the middle of the East Coast in the US).
I am personally an introvert, so it’s lovely when I don’t have to waste anyone’s time with small-talk (like in the south), and I just say, “Hello, I would like” “please” and “thank you”, and the transaction is over.
At least saying “bonjour” is very important in France, but I don’t think that’s so different from here in the US. I think American tourists and ex-pats don’t realize that’s a thing, and they don’t think about the fact that they have to say “hello” in French first wherever they go in France.
But I see the other side of things as well, where it’s nice when your fellow humans care about you and want to pass on some good vibes in making a nice comment or sending a “Hello” with a smile your way when you pass on the sidewalk in a small town.
You just have to know which level of politeness to use where!
I would think that the “bare minimum courtesy” you owe a retail worker is to acknowledge their existence by greeting them, but hey, I’m not a New Yorker.
i’m not a new yorker, but i was raised by one, and here in pennsylvania, you’d generally say (to a worker) “excuse me….”, and when talking with my friends i’ll go, “hey!” and then immediately start in on the conversation.
like, if you’re doing something that won’t be longer than five minutes maximum, you say “excuse me”. if you’ll know the person for two weeks, then you’ll get to the polite “how are you”s.
personally, i wouldn’t know how to make small talk with a worker. it’s seen as weird and very rude and foreign here. you’re wasting their time.
Inspiration Haven 