how’s your smile today?

I don’t know about you guys but I personally think that women seem to have it in one of their traits to pen such good posts. Though with the exception of Mr Brown, Mr Beng and few other male bloggers out there who are exceptionally good, at the end of the day, I always ended up going back to read female bloggers’ blogs.

Published by suzanne-jung at 7:28 am under General

Have you ever counted how many different types of smiles there are? Hmm… don’t try. You will probably lose count if it’s true that we’re capable of over 200 different smiles as some people claim…

 A smile is a very powerful weapon… it can be used to ‘break the ice’. We’re usually drawn to smiling faces, especially those that radiate kindness and friendliness.

 A smile sends out a very positive energy too… it’s contagious, truly! My 5-month-old niece came to visit from Korea recently. She’s an absolute darling, smiling most of the time. No matter how tired I was or how bad my day went – and I had a very bad day one time – her innocent smile would instantly brighten me up! I can’t think of anyone who wouldn’t smile at a baby for that matter, regardless of the mood he/she is in. ( I can’t resist, so I’m putting up my niece pics… with permission from my sister Isn’t she cute?!!)

Now, if the smile of an infant only several months old can have such a positive effect, imagine what ours can do.

 Our smiles don’t just impact others, we feel good as well. There was a study done to prove a forced smile is better than no smile. Apparently, our brains don’t really know the difference between reality and pretense, so when you pretend to feel a certain way, say in this instance, smile… your brain will release endorphins (happy hormones) and you’ll feel better instantly. So that’s why they say keep smiling even if you don’t feel like it… the effects are far reaching…

 There’s no conclusive study that tells us for sure how many smiles exist out there, but it’s safe to say many experts agree there are more than a dozen different ones. From genuinely happy to the more reserved, from the flirty flashes to the ‘I’m embarrassed’ grin. If you listen intently, you’ll see that smiling also affects how we speak… to the point that we can identify the type of smile based on sound alone! 

While a smile usually means something good, we know that sometimes they are not what they seem. No, not phoney… just more… complex shall we say? As Shakespeare’s character in Macbeth states ” There’s daggers in men’s smile.”… They’re definitely not the warm type. Anyway, the reason why I brought up the subject on smiles is because I just interviewed a Japanese lady on PTM… Momoyo Torimitsu. She embarked on a very interesting project looking at how your profession determines the smile you put on everyday… and you wear it like a costume.

She talked about 4 different types of smiles:
- The confident but cautious businessman smile
- Warm and helpful “I’m at your service” hotel bellboy smile
- Fun and Friendly nursery school teacher smile
- Overzealous and excited entertainer smile

 Of course, there are many more… Well, out of curiosity, Steve and I asked “So how would you categorize our smiles?”

 We labeled ourselves ‘the genuine smile’.
What we failed to mention is that it’s a ‘necessary smile’ too.
Our smiles in the morning help us… well, it certainly does for me and I’m hoping it helps you too – to start your day on a positive and informed note.

So what say you?

link:http://blogs.channelnewsasia.com/suzanne-jung/2008/07/03/hows-your-smile-today/

Correction, I like to read blogs penned by female bloggers who actually express their thoughts on issues concerning daily lives and not some petty things like quarrelling with boyfriend/mother/father/the whole world. Of course, two of my favourite bloggers are already mentioned in my blog (spot who!). This is because I feel they are worth mentioning here.

Suzanne Jung is one of them, save that she do not really update regularly. For those who took the morning buses to work or to school or to *insert destinated place*, the name is no stranger especially if the bus is being installed with MobileTV. But for the uninitiated, Suzanne Jung Ki Eng is the female anchor for Primetime Morning. In fact, if you ask me, I think SHE is the face of Primetime Morning. She and Timothy Ngo are a great team until Timothy is replaced by WhatshisName.

Even so, Suzanne can carry the show off pretty well. It helps that she has a sense of humor.

Anyways the article about smiling gets me thinking about one guy I have noticed in my workplace for a long time. Actually, it was his tall as a pole stature that made me noticed me. Being a short person, I thought I have come across all sorts of heights in my approaching 26^th life, but this guy has got to be the cream of the cake.

Tall and dark, he was of a quiet nature and every time our paths crossed, we seem to treat each other invisible and just went on our way. That’s it. No smiles, no hi, no nothing. Even though we are under same company but different subsidiaries.

Unless if you want to count that one time where his big boots stepped on my high heels as a form of communication. Or a lot of times where we sat beside each other but did not really talk.

HS put her investigation skills into good use and we both managed to find out some information about him. (See, HS, sometimes it pays to be the popular one in the company.) Let’s call him Pink Panther (because every time when I saw him, the music score “Pink Panther” automatically played in my head).

But there’s another reason why I noticed him. A lot.

How can you not miss the expression of the tallest guy in the canteen?

After months of observing him, I realized this guy seemed to have only one expression tailored for his face. Say, to conclude he has an expressionless face is putting mildly. I seriously don’t know about you but stoic is more like. But sometimes, he looked close to brooding. Or mourning, if you ask me. I wonder if an aircraft engine suddenly died and he came back from the burial ceremony (he is the trainee technician in one of our subsidiaries). Sometimes, I let my imagination run wild and that he is actually vying for Guinness World of Records for the Most Stoic Expression.  I do not know. Neither do I intend to find out.

What I do know is that he always with the same face. In fact, when he is eating with his friends, his expression remains the same. When his friends were laughing, his expression remains the same. When his friends thanked him for buying them drinks, the expressionless one remained like that. Therefore, I can safely conclude the rest:

When he is happy: Expressionless. When he is sad: Expressionless. When he is bitter: Expressionless. When he is angry: Expressionless.

Whatever it is, it became a topic for our tea-break last night. Amplifier whom I filled in about him, reluctantly agreed what I said about him being expressionless.

“Stoic though is more like it,” Amplifier boomed in her loud voice.

I half-shrugged to indicate that I caught her drift. Then something occurred to me, “I wonder if it saves body energy if we maintain one expression for the whole day?”

Amplifier stopped eating her Siew Mai and looked at me, thinking the same thing. Then at the same moment, we both said, “Nah” and continued eating. Senior Sam caught gist of what we were talking and turned to survey Pink Panther.

Then another thought occurred to me. “Hey woman, can you imagine if your husband make love to you wearing the stoic expression like that?”

Amplifier nearly choked laughing. She was about to answer when she was interrupted by Senior Sam who said, “He will be screaming. How to keep up with the stoic expression?”

This time, both me and Amplifier nearly spilled the water we were drinking. Amplifier remarked, “As far as I know, when a boy and a girl fornicates, it is usually the girl screaming. And not the boy.”

I quipped, “Unless the straight boy finds out the girl is actually a guy.”

Knowing it is useless trying to outtalk a pregnant woman who is backed up by another woman, Senior Sam rolled his eyes. Done with my food, I got up to buy a drink before heading back to office. Then it happened.

I suddenly recalled a joke Asse told me before, making me smiled my goofily. Then I turned. Unfortunately, he turned at the same time and we faced each other. My smile froze as I realized he thought I was smiling at him. This was evident as his expression changed (yes, it finally changed. But for the wrong reason) and he froze too as though it was the first time someone acknowledged him and smiled at him. Then as suddenly as the time froze, it defrosted back.I practically sprinted out of canteen. 

OMG.

It will be a very long time before I will be going back to canteen for tea breaks.