Chit chatter, I am not of those creature; If you're a talker, will mywords matter?

I was chatting with my friend the other day about starting conversations with stranger, especially during travels. My friend told how there was a time when my friend struck a conversation with an older woman(makcik) that they chatted the whole way. After the makcik stepped out the train, my friend's friend asked,"Sape tu tadi?"
To which my friend somberly answered,"Ntah."
Lol. "Aku ingatkan kawan mak ko ke sape. Cakap mcm kenal rapat."

Some people like this, perplexs me. There is a reason why people use the phrase,'strike a conversation', the same word used in 'lightning strikes', because conversations happen in an instance. When asked how the conversations start, or how to chat people up, my friend gave an ambigous 'dunno'.

Just now as the bus I rode from KL to Kedah stopped at a highway-
stop(RnR), I stepped off the bus and went to the toilet. A man(pakcik) came to the sinks and washed his hands. Suddenly he said,"Ada sabun dak," his eyes directed to a soap dispenser in front/between us.
Since I hadn't use it,I said,"tak tahu lah pulak saya," and laughed, because I laughed when I don't have anything to say and trying to avoid the awkward silence.
The pakcik then pushes his palm against the dispenser.
I thought, if you wanted to try it anyway, why'd you ask?
The dispenser was quite empty, yet the pakcik was still pressing it.
"Dah takdak dah ha," he said, more to himself.
Yes, I can see that, I thought; but why are you still pushing the poor thing?
As he kept on, I finally said,"Kat sana tu ada lagi," pointing to another dispenser which was three sinks away.
Pakcik lifted his head to the pointed direction, said nothing, and kept pressing the dispenser. I wanted to repeat what I said but decided against it.
In the end, the dispenser managed to splutter some soap, which fell on the sink. Pakcik wipe the soap up(good action) and said, "tumpah sampai ke sinki plak dah." I didn't hear it thr first time so he repeated,"tumpah."
I just laughed and he left.

There are several things I wanted to say, like why do you ask when you're going to try the thing anyway. It's like people asking the weather or something they've already known. Yes I know, it's called being ramah.
But deep in my heart of mine, I felt it unnecessary because to me, I only ask to what I want to know, and earnestly listen(yeah, cause the answers are important). I've noticed that in certain cases this is the practical thing to do.

But most times, especially during travels, this is not the case. Chit-chats are the basis of good travel-info research. It's the way to know those best stalls that the locals frequent, the spots where tourist miss and the scams that they normally fell to.
Don't you think so?

Agatha Christie who wrote detectives novel, always uses conversations as solving method. If people are chat up, they'll loosen up and more likely to tell the truth, or spill the beans. So in my mind I believe that we have to be ramah and all, but the problem is how. It seems that I need to rewire my mind.

Again.


Thanks for reading.

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Hot food shouldn't be pack in plastic bag. 

They can cause cancer