Ethnography

Ethnography

September 20, 2015

Old People and Smart Phones... How Adorable!

Its Sunday evening, it is a little hot outside and it is pretty packed here in the corner café. Even though there are so many people here it is still pretty quiet. There is light indie music playing in the background with a small roar of conversation. There are a lot of people inside doing homework by themselves, and there are a few pairs of people studying together. There seems to be a pause in people coming or leaving. Everyone appears to be planning on staying here for a long time.
There are two people to my left obviously flirting and being quite annoying. Stealing each others cookies and playfully pushing each others arms and laughing at EVERY little thing. They are also leaning in and whispering and carrying a long conversation. There is a young man sitting in front of me in the comfy chairs jus playing on his phone. He seems very content. There are two groups of people sitting and working on homework to my right. They all have drinks and are all the medium size. They are also all iced, I assume because it is still pretty warm outside. There are no reoccurring faces today, even the quirky barista isn’t working today.
There are four general areas for people to be in when they come in here. There is the main area where all the tables and comfy chairs are, there is a more isolated place where there are less tables and away from the bar, there are the high tables, and outside. There seems to be a trend of what types of people or groups sit in each area. Study groups usually sit in the main area just because there are two tables that can sit four people.  Also, couples or pairs usually sit in the comfy chairs because, I think, it makes them feel comfortable but also puts people in the mood to talk. People who come by themselves who need to do stuff on their computers or to read also sit in the comfy chairs so that they have they’re own personal space. But people who come in by themselves that have actual work to do on paper or with books sit at one of the tables. The people who sit in the corner are usually by themselves and seem to not want to be disturbed so they place themselves there. They are also the ones who have both earphones in and very rarely look up. The high tables attract those who come in and just wait for there coffee and leave, or for those people who just want to talk and drink coffee. The high tables are in the loudest area of the Café because it is right in front of the coffee machine and under a few speakers.
Now there are more people who came in. There are three new people and all are older men and women who are sitting in the comfy chairs with their hot latte’s and staring at there phones. It is very amusing because none of them came in together, but they look the exact same way. They all have their legs crossed, leaning to one side with that elbow on the arm rest, holding their phone with the hand that is resting on the arm of the chair and holding their glasses in front of their foreheads to be able to read what is on the screen. They all seem to have something very interesting and intriguing on their phones and are glued to them.
You can see a barrier in “smart phone mannerisms” between the older and younger generations. Almost every single “young” person in here are holding their phones with both hands and using there thumbs to navigate. All old people are holding the phone with one and and navigating on the screen with the pointer or middle fingers of the other hand with the rest of the fingers stiff and straight out rather than bent into a partial fist. It’s very interesting watching people on their phones.

The amount of people has not changed much in the past hour or so, most of the people that are here were here when I arrived. Sundays are definitely study days.  

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