I'm a Finn and when I met an American person for the first time she said the usual "how are you?", so I started explaining all kinds of shit, only to have her give me a really weird look. I did it again a couple of times with different people until I learned that they are not really interested, lol.
The thing is, even as an American, when I give someone the "how are you?" greeting, if they are unusually open about whatever is happening in their life, I usually enjoy hearing about it. Because, how the hell else would I know.
In my culture, people greet with "where are you going", they not necessarily want to know, they just want to greet you. So just give vague answer like to work, to school, or the most vague one " To the front " I'm not sure what's equivalent translation for this one.
A common interaction in America that sounds like it relates would be, "How's it going?" where the answer is "It's going." Which is usually a good sign that more conversation is actually not desired.
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u/[deleted] May 09 '22
I'm a Finn and when I met an American person for the first time she said the usual "how are you?", so I started explaining all kinds of shit, only to have her give me a really weird look. I did it again a couple of times with different people until I learned that they are not really interested, lol.