Thread by @andreasklinger

On my first trip to Bulgaria, I had to convince an EU-funding expert about a project we wanted to partner on.

I was trying so hard to excite him.
Nothing. Even worse. He was silently disagreeing.

I tried harder and even made up stuff.
But he just kept cold-face shaking his head

Afterwards, he told in dry Bulgarian English:
"Great idea. Love it. We should partner."

My head went 🤯

Then my bulgarian team members pulled me aside and reminded me that in Bulgaria people shake their heads for "Yes" and nod for "No". 🤯^2

The whole meeting he was agreeing with me.

And once i got really intense he agreed on every line.

Most likely i made him even a bit uncomfortable by being so intense. He just shrugged it off as "Western Europeans are f'ing crazy" and kept agreeing.

He kept shaking his head 🙈

I wasn't used to this kind of social convention.

I was overcompensating and emoting harder and being frustrated.

I learned it, it was still weird at some times. But i just kept reminding myself.

Shaking heads just means "Yes".
Stone cold face just means "Smile". (scnr 😉)

Anyway,

this is a very long-winded way to say:

Sharing excitement over Zoom is hard.

Most of us aren't used to the new social conventions yet.

Keep reminding yourself. People just show their excitement differently.