The awkwardness that are called Elevators

People behave strangely when it comes to Lifts (nope, I'm not going to use the word "elevators". I'm more British than being American). As much as I'm fascinated by the engineering genius behind Lifts, I'm more intrigued by the behavior of people when it comes to using this fascinating piece of machinery .

It starts right from calling for lifts using those two simple buttons. I always see people getting confused while using the up and down buttons. They aren't sure if the direction button indicates where they want to go or is it a direction meant for the Lift. To be safe, they end up pressing both only to awkwardly ask "is it going up or down?" to an expressionless person when the Lift door opens. And you don't want to be that expressionless person inside the Lift. It's so frustrating when the door opens and you see somebody sheepishly inquiring if you are going up or down. I always wanted to reply "I sure about where I'm going, but are you?" or just show the middle finger!

Once inside the Lift, human beings are driven to the highest degrees of awkwardness. As the lift door closes, everyone starts looking at the floor or pay extreme attention to the dirt sticking in their own shoes.  Some people, as though they are travelling in Mumbai suburbs, restlessly look at the electronic display of floor numbers to make sure they don't miss their floor!. Fleeting eye contacts are made with fellow passengers and are immediately broken. People hold on to their stuff so dearly as though someone else is going to take it away from them (even if they, where can they go?). Some just unlock and lock their phones repeatedly even if there is nothing new to look at. I'm not sure if the inherent fear of being stuck in a relatively small confined space with a group of strangers leads to such unexplainable behavior.

And things become interesting when women are a part of this. I've observed the following scenario innumerable number of times. A lift carrying a few guys (including me) stops to take in a pretty girl. You will observe that everyone in the lift will change their postures. The ones leaning of the walls will straighten up; the ones with their heads drooping will look straight ahead; a few will start showing off their gadgets; some will take deep breaths. Ah! we men are fascinating creatures!

We also find ourselves in pleasantly awkward situations when we find ourselves alone in a lift with a girl. We try to avoid the looking at the girl as much as possible, and yet at the same time steel some glances. We try to look disinterested and oblivious of the presence of the girl (as though our "playing hard to get" matters anyways!). And we don't feel an iota of offense when she rushes out of the lift as soon as the door opens only a few inches! All you are left wondering why the hell you had spent that 150 bucks on that AXE deo. And sometimes, rarely, in an alternate universe, if the girl ends up giving us a smile, we are too shocked to return the same. By the time we realize what had happened and make up our face for a fitting response, the lift stops and she disappears into the opening doors. Hmph.

It's quite interesting man hasn't yet mastered socializing in Elevators..oops. sorry Lifts.

P.S: And the poor lift operators. Some jobs are not just meant to be. Just imagine being stuck all day in a box of 5x5 ft, pressing some buttons, opening and closing doors. Seriously? Even after such extra-ordinary technical advancements, this job has persisted as the cockroach!