Monday, January 21, 2008

People Say Crazy S**t

When youre listening to other people and they don't know youre listening they say some crazy s**t and it only makes sense right? they only think the person they are talking to is listening and the funny thing is that person probably isn'y listening at all peopel have a problem with listening but i digress i listened to the bar and as the night progressed conversations and noises started to get more and more obscure. after awhile sounds started to just converge into one mass of audio activity it was kinda interesting. but like i said this experiment forced me to here some pretty weird things coming out of people who were fairly intoxicated beyond drunken banter it was interesting how much more you are aware of your surroundings.

Listening activity

For my post I sat in the rec center. I sat infront of the television screens and just took everything in around me. There was so much going on at one time that I would never really notice if I wasnt paying attention. I heard the sound of golf balls being hit from the golf simulator. I heard the crash of pool balls, and the sound of ping-pong. There were also the sounds of the weight room. Some of these were the sound of weights dropping, feet pounding a tredmill, clanging machines. On top of these sounds there was also lots of talking. Many different conversations were taking place and it was hard to hear the details of any of them. There were also televisions and music. It was interesting to me to realize just how much noise there is when a person stops to listen to it. We live in our own worlds most of the time and are not really concerned with the actions taking place around us.

Listening

So for my listening "homework" I chose to listen to things at the Detroit Auto Show today. It was interesting listening to the amount of things going on all at once. The North American International Auto Show contains an assortment of cars from Ferrari's to Chevy's. Going by each manufacturer's displays, many different types of music were playing, like the American made cars (Ford, Chevy, GMC) had pop style music and the "DUB" sections, dedicated to more stylish custom cars had a hip-hop feel to it. The Ferrari's and Mercedes Benz displays had no loud music, but focused more on the cars. And the BMW, Volkswagen, Mini displays had a more Euro/Techno feel to the music.
Along with the music I also heard a variety of accents, and languages, being an "international" show I really expected to see and hear all these different cultures and languages. Standing by the Exotic cars (Ferrari and Bentley) I heard all the different accents including Asian, Latino, European, Canadian, and the American styles. It was interesting to hear the same reactions from all the different languages, and even the barriers don't change the reaction to seeing a $400,000 Car, like gasps and awes.
With the music and languages, I also heard the random horns and doors closing. It got really annoying actually after awhile, because when I got to taking a picture, I usually ended up by another car. So when a little kid hit the horn, I was usually the first to notice being right beside it... Yeah not fun.
But overall, I loved going to the show and seeing and hear all these sights and sounds.

Listening

I think the walking exercise we did in class was pretty sweet. It was kind of like scattered and organized if that makes any sense at all. It does in my head so i am ok with that :). So today i went to the international Car show with some friends in Detroit and that is where i did my listening exercise. I sat around the Mazda displays where there were a few dream like concept cars. I just listened to the different people's reactions when they would see the cars for the first time. It was funny to hear the simularities between boys reactions and grown mens reactions. I could almost hear their mouths hanging open and the drool hitting the floor. After that initial gasp of disbelief, they all said the same thing: "Whoa look at that!" It was funny to hear how grown men sounded just like the children consumed with shock and awe.

Taking Time to Hear

For my listening observation I chose to sit in the kitchen/ laundry room/ sitting room on our floor in the dorm. While sitting there at first I only heard the sounds of the washers and dryers, but then as I focused more on just listening and heard a lot more. I could hear music coming from different rooms. I could hear people talking, but I couldn't hear exactly what they were saying unless the were walking by or in and out of the room. Also i could hear people's foot steps from the floor above, and doors opening and closing. Finally I could hear the wind howling by the windows and the sounds of cars driving in and out of the parking lot. It was really cool to just sit and listen to what was going on around me, it really reminds you that even though you may feel like you're alone, most of the time you definitely are not.

To Truly Listen

Listening is the topic of my second post. For this I decided to go to the Patterson Lab. There I listened to people either conversing or trying desperately to complete some homework assignment. It was different from the seeing exercise because the individuals did not realize that I was listening to their every move. Every rustle of paper, every click of the keyboard, I heard it all. It was easy to flow from one conversation to the next because there were pockets of two or three individuals who would be conversing. When there were no people to listen to there was certainly the steady rhythm of the air vent that was situated directly above me.

Listening...

The listening exercise we did in class was not as hard as the seeing one most probably because the members of my group agreed on the quite familiar for me sound of the ocean. I always go home (Bulgaria) over the summer and I usually try to go to the seaside (The Black Sea) for at least a week. I truly enjoy just lying on the beach and doing nothing but listening to the waves. When we sat on the chairs in class trying to "hear" the sound of the ocean, that was easy for me. I even enjoyed it because it made me think about the warm weather, vacation, and relaxation. I believe that it could be relatively easy for one to interpret something on stage if he/she is well acquainted with it.

Listening Activity

For my listening activity, i decided to just lay around in my dorm room. I started out trying to focus on just listening in convo, but that did not work to well for me because i am so used to talking and such so i couldnt settle down enough to just listen. While laying in my dorm room i could hear so much. First is the tv in the other room where my roommate was watching tv. Then i heard people talking outside as they were walking to or from class, i heard my suitemate in the other room typing away on her computer, i heard a plane fly by, cars passing, and choral. Choral is our ghost that haunts us. With choral i heard tapping on our middle room door. (Kinda weird, but it makes us feel better if we name the mysterious noises!) I could hear doors slamming from floors above and below me. I of course through all of this thought about myself breathing and focused a little bit on what my breathing sounded like! It was cool how all of this could happen at once and most of the time go unnoticed! See you guys!