Was I rude for dismissing a stranger who interrupted me on the platform?

[KookyLemonReader]

About a year ago I started a new job in finance in the City which has been very intense. The previous week I have been working very intensely to meet an end of week deadline. I am contractually required to be in the office at least one day a week so on Thurs I dragged myself out to the office. In the early afternoon I was at the local tube station platform waiting for the train and on my laptop deep in work mode when I noticed someone trying to get my attention in my peripheral vision. I turned away from my laptop removed my headphones and listened to the man. He was asking me where my handbag is from. I was very irritated that he interrupted me with this when I was clearly deep in concentration and replied in a cold way ‘I am working’ and went back to my business. A few seconds later I felt bad (also this man was an ethnic minority and I’m a white woman so I worried about that) turned back to him and said I’m sorry I was a bit rude what did you ask. He again asked where my bag is from. I told him the brand (vintage Italian designer). He made some random comment like oh I can’t buy that here I guess. I didn’t engage. Went back to my work. My concentration was lost and I was very annoyed by the whole exchange but also questioning myself. Was I awful or is it fair that he should not have interrupted a clearly full of focus person with a silly question?

Yes, I think you were rude. I appreciate your mind was on your work, but you were rude and curt.

I also think emotionally intelligent men would know not to creep a woman out by starting a totally unorganic conversation.

You were rude if someone just wanted to know where your bag was from. You could have answered him politely. Then you could have said sorry, I'm working, if he tried to continue the conversation. Manners and kindness cost nothing.

I'd have lied and said Zara or something. Sounds dodgy coming from a bloke of ethnic origin. Never tell the truth to a complete stranger!

I don’t understand why you wrote ‘it may have confused some readers who did not pay attention’. I think that is very rude, especially where you’re asking for advice from those readers!

Sounds dodgy coming from a bloke of ethnic origin.

Why? And what does ‘ethnic origin’ mean? Technically, we all have an ethnic origin.

🙄 Seriously?

A male stranger approaching a lone woman wearing headphones using a laptop. Sure he was just curious about fashion. 🙄
He was sussing her out for one thing or another. It wasn't idle curiosity.

As she, and all lone women, should be when approached by randos with out of nowhere questions.

I think other PP have been unnecessarily harsh.

No one is "owed" conversation and by virtue of the fact you had headphones in and were staring into a laptop, it's clear you were working (although it wouldn't have matter if you were catching up on the latest episode of Ted Lasso).

He was the rude one IMO.

I was quoting the OP! Not my words.

The OP asked if she was rude and I replied with my opinion.

And I don’t think you need to be rude in those circumstances. OP could’ve replied with something like, ‘why do you ask?’ or ‘I can’t remember’ etc if she didn’t want to answer the question and wanted to close the conversation without seeming rude.

OP said ‘this man was an ethnic minority.’

It’s unnecessary and, yes, it is rude. It’s not polite. I doubt OP would’ve said it if she was talking to us all in person!

What about the man. Is he rude to do enough to get the attention of someone who is focused on their laptop to ask a question that was completely unimportant

edited to add

What it boils down to is whose time is more important, does the op have to break off from what she's doing to answer a question?

I don’t think the man was rude to ask what he asked when the OP was clearly focused on working. I think he was a bit thoughtless though. And no, of course the OP doesn’t need to break off from what she’s doing to answer. The point is she asked us if she was rude and I replied with my opinion on that.

Women who feel compelled to be polite to random men in situations like that often find the question wasn't so innocent.

A man would not interrupt another man in the same manner with the same query. It would never happen. It is always a front for something.

Let me guess…you’re a man.
So you have never experienced the constant harassment, misogyny, sexual advances etc that women have to face from around the age of 12.
You have never had “cheer up luv” shouted at you just because you don’t have a smile plastered across your face.
You have never worked somewhere where men deliberately push by you far too closely, just do they can feel you up.
You haven’t had your bum punched by a stranger, you’ve never felt uncomfortable in a situation where a man is trying to chat you up and won’t take a hint when you tell him you’re not interested, I would hazard a guess you’ve never been raped or sexually assaulted.
If you had experienced ANY of this, you certainly wouldn’t entertain a random man attempting to talk to you when you are busy doing something else.

I was recently spat at when a man approached me when I was with my two small children. He wanted money, I told him No and to back away from my children.

I think you were a bit rude and that was appropriate, given the way he interrupted you.

Also agree with several others that he would have been very unlikely to do it to a man and probably wasn't actually interested in your bag at all.

I can't help thinking that it's a bit odd to be 'deep in work' mode on a tube platform. The trains are really frequent,so there's no way I'd be distracting myself with a laptop screen and wearing headphones!

Yet people do all day, every day.

I’m not sure what you mean, because OP clearly didn’t ’feel compelled to be polite’ and I didn’t say she should feel that way. And it’s not always a front for something!

I’m not a man - I am a woman in my mid-thirties, and I’ve had the following happen to me (all with men who were strangers to me):

• A man tried to forcibly kiss me on the cheek and hug me on holiday when I was six and alone
• A man on a course I was doing snuck into the room I was staying whilst I was asleep and fall asleep on the bed next to mine, and when I found out and called him out on it the next morning, he just laughed
• Another man on the same course told me I was ‘not like the other girls‘ and tried to kiss me
• A man shouted at me in the middle of a public park and wave a knife at me and tell me to ‘get out of here, you crazy fucker’
• A man sat next to me on a bench in a public park and try to chat me up and try to force me to give him my email address and phone address

Up North West start conversations with anyone and everyone and go around smiling and being friendly. It doesn't kill to be nice