Scene: Potluck at friends place. For those people in
India who are not aware of what a Potluck is, it is an event where lots of people cook some stuff and congregate at a place and eat. If you want to be seen as a sociable guy who hosts loads of parties at your place but lack the culinary skills to cook for a big group or don’t wanna spend money ordering food , potluck is the way to go. All you need to do is send out a mail "hey, I am organizing a potluck at my place". And if
ur the host you can get away with not cooking anything also. People don’t ask and even if they do just point at the table where all the dishes are kept and say a random food name like Assamese Texas style grilled vegetable curry. The reason I hate potlucks is that there are too many people in a constrained space. Also when I leave I despise the fact that I have to turn to the potluck hosts and say thanks for hosting this potluck. It seems so wrong. It is against my fundamental principles. And another reason is that most of my potlucks are with friends whose wife’s are very good cooks. So I end up bringing back 90% of what i cooked which is also humiliating. Everybody leaves with empty vessels and I amthe only guy carrying everything back. Basically one percent is by people who taste it and the 9 % is eaten by me as I don’t want people to see that nobody has eaten my stuff. And whenever people taste my dish, the adjective used most of the time to describe my cooking - " It is interesting".
Because of such incidents, the word interesting used to evoke negative thoughts in my mind until one day it hit upon me that interesting could be one of the most useful word I have ever learned. In American society it is acceptable to describe anything as interesting. We don’t use interesting to describe a person, back in India. But here it works. And here you can use it to describe a person whom u like/don’t mind hanging out/absolutely detest and still appear normal. Let me give you an example. Suppose people ask you an opinion about a person A and you like him. Then you can go "yeah, I like A, A is interesting." Make sure u say this in a highly excited voice. But the place where interesting helps the most is when people ask you opinion about a person B whom u don’t get along with.
Say a person C asks "Hey what do u think of B?" Then you can choose from the following responses.
B is interesting, but <insert negative attribute of the person here>
B is interesting, but ..........u know ... and shrug couple of times..most probably the other guys goes " yeah i know " and the conversation ends there...
Yeah, B is interesting (say this in a bored voice), but (now act like ur thinking deeply) <..pause....pause...then say in a doubtful voice>..I don’t know…..u know.....somehow ,dont wanna hang out with him...
And if u play ur cards correctly u can go
B is interesting, but say in a slow voice filled with regret, ur negative attribute which is the reason why u guys dont hang out. Kinda like the "it is not you it is me" break up routine. Shift the blame onto you.
and my favorite
B is interesting but we just haven't hanged out..work.. ..u know..deadlines..
There is no other word which helps you convey the fact that you hate a person in a positive manner than interesting. It is brilliant. Whenever u are suddenly asked an opinion about anything in a social setting and if ur the type who panics and struggles to say something not stupid under such circumstances, interesting is the way to go.
How was the book? interesting.
the food? interesting.
movie?interesting.
place? Interesting.
music ?Interesting.
And if you actually like the object whose attributes you are being asked to give an opinion about , all you need to do is to prefix interesting with really or really really.
How was the book? really really interesting.
