Personal space, the Coffee Cup Test. . .
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I invite anyone here at the Archiseek board to walk by Grafton Street in Dublin, at around 6 pm, or slightly later some evening …. i.e. when the crowds have more or less gone home and things should really be easing down a bit. Then, having purchased 1 no. cup of ‘coffee to go’ from Bewleys or otherwise, proceed to stand in Grafton Street with your back pressed tight up against some shop window.
Now watch what happens, when you stand, back pressed up against the glass shop window and cup of steaming hot tea held approx. 50mm away from your chest.
For some unearthly reason, despite the fact, that people using Grafton Street have the whole width of Grafton Street to avoid you and your cup of tea/coffee held in your hand…. just count the number of times some member of the public, young, old, rich, poor, male or female, manages to bump into that said cup of coffee, causing you to spill it over yourself. (Make sure and use an old shirt to conduct this experiment)
I myself counted around 10 hits every minute! This is with no rain at all, and people having the whole width of Grafton Street to walk in. You cannot even find a slim, less than 300mm of space, in which to stand and not be bothered. It is like unconsciously, people are ‘forcing’ you to keep moving rather than stand around minding your own business.
Does the concept of ‘personal space’ even exist in Grafton Street…. I mean, when you cannot even hold a cup of coffee 50mm from your chest, with your back pressed firmly up against a glass shop front window? This is something I have suspected now for a great deal of time, but until recently never took the time to prove this phenomena to myself.
Brian O’ Hanlon.
Originally posted by garethace
I invite anyone here at the Archiseek board to walk by Grafton Street in Dublin, at around 6 pm, or slightly later some evening …. i.e. when the crowds have more or less gone home and things should really be easing down a bit. Then, having purchased 1 no. cup of ‘coffee to go’ from Bewleys or otherwise, proceed to stand in Grafton Street with your back pressed tight up against some shop window.Now watch what happens, when you stand, back pressed up against the glass shop window and cup of steaming hot tea held approx. 50mm away from your chest.
For some unearthly reason, despite the fact, that people using Grafton Street have the whole width of Grafton Street to avoid you and your cup of tea/coffee held in your hand…. just count the number of times some member of the public, young, old, rich, poor, male or female, manages to bump into that said cup of coffee, causing you to spill it over yourself. (Make sure and use an old shirt to conduct this experiment)
I myself counted around 10 hits every minute! This is with no rain at all, and people having the whole width of Grafton Street to walk in. You cannot even find a slim, less than 300mm of space, in which to stand and not be bothered. It is like unconsciously, people are ‘forcing’ you to keep moving rather than stand around minding your own business.
Does the concept of ‘personal space’ even exist in Grafton Street…. I mean, when you cannot even hold a cup of coffee 50mm from your chest, with your back pressed firmly up against a glass shop front window? This is something I have suspected now for a great deal of time, but until recently never took the time to prove this phenomena to myself.
Brian O’ Hanlon.
in fairness the first two people that did it i’d let it go and explain it away as an accident. the third (or if the third is female then hte next male) would get the remainder of the cup against the back of the head then a quick slap.
impinge on me you scum……i dare ya
There is a nice building just finished on a corner on Duke Street…. which is worth giving a look at … it is a valiant attempt at doing a corner building in that area of the city. The scafolding only just came off I think.
Anyhow, I would have had my cup of coffee looking at that, except I decided to have it in Grafton Street instead…. big mistake. It was the cherry on the cake that was my day, having scalding hot Bewley’s tea put all over you by uncaring passing pedestrians.
I mean, I was quite literally stuck to the wall, too, while all this was going on, and after the first spill, I decided I was already ‘so wet and scalded’ that I would conduct the experiment for 5 minutes. About 10 hits every five minutes I reckon on average.
It really didn’t seem to matter what breed, race, sex or age or people either…. the concept of a personal ‘bubble’ doesn’t exist in Grafton Street, and that is why most people don’t like it I think.
Sean O’Laoire brought up this point not too long ago, about the new different cultures of people here in Dublin now, having different definitions of what ‘a bubble of personal space’ actually is.
But, my observations shows, that in places like Grafton Street, that bubble is so reduced as to become of no use whatsoever…. all you can do actually is run out of the place.
You seen unsure as to whether it was tea or coffee you were drinking Brian – says a lot about Bewleys!
On the issue in general of people being utterly oblivious to anyone other than themselves on a street, it is extraordinary the amount of people who drive you off the footpath onto the roadway, 95% of them women.
The worst offenders are on Stephens Green, where if you’re walking near the edge and someone’s approaching you, instead of them moving more into the middle and allowing you to walk along the wide kerbs,they just stay put, forcing you out onto the road.
It is so rude and happens all the time – I know it sounds petty here but in ‘real lfe’ is infuriating.The most critical factor in this experiment, is not to use ordinary cold water, since then the experiment doesn’t make nearly the same impact upon you as spilling Bewley’s scalding hot tea/coffee all over yourself.
I mean, Bewleys give you two cardboard cups – one inside the other…. in that way, you can be assured of scalding hot water…. and it makes you ‘extra’ mad when people spill it on you. If it was cold water it would be like rain, and we are just too used to getting soaked with cold fresh rain in this country.
The object of the experiment, is really to test the ‘zone of personal space’ that exists, or doesn’t exist around you in various parts of the city. I have heard many strories about Grafton Street where women especially, had bought ‘that coat’ they had been waiting months for, only to arrive back at the car park, to find themselves holding nothing more than the handles, with the bag itself snipped off.
So there is a tip, if buying in Grafton Street – don’t end up carrying your week’s worth of grocceries and that coat that cost €400 at the same time – please make TWO trips and avoid, amateur artful dodgers, who have it too easy in a place like Grafton Street to relieve you of your personal belongings. Because the zone of personal space is so dramatically reduced – it is only later, after being robbed, you realise the implications of this phenomena.
But it is like that ad on TV, about women being able to think about several things at once…. sometimes it doesn’t always work to their advantage, and men are much more likely to make two or three trips back to the car booth, rather than lug around with a whole load of bags, advertising to be robbed.
thanx, I appreciate that stat, it is nice to have things like that on the tip of one’s toungue. 🙂
I wonder how Temple Bar woulf fair out in terms of handbags too, or Trinity grounds in terms of bicycle vandalism etc, etc.
Another place where you cannot leave a bike now either, is at the quiet end of fishamble/essex st, near Wood Quay civic offices.
I enjoyed circum navigating the city centre today on bike, it was interesting to see places like Constitution hill and Western Way, Black Church etc, normally deserted places…. with the same kind of atmosphere as a point-to-point race meeting, a County Final or a country fair, down the country somewhere.
Mind you, I don’t like the Dublin city maranthon as much, since I witnessed an awful load of shop lifting and general abuse given to shop owners etc, etc around the city centre, by little gouriers.
The city centre is a place I would avoid on Marathon day, especially grafton st.
I enjoyed circum navigating the city centre today on bike, it was interesting to see places like Constitution hill and Western Way, Black Church etc, normally deserted places…. with the same kind of atmosphere as a point-to-point race meeting or country fair, down the country somewhere.
I was just thinking, it would have been a nice exercise today, to just have carried a camera with me to shoot this scenes, which for the other 364 days of the year, wouldn’t ever happen.
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