"Nicholas Nauman, Eat’s 28-year-old managing chef and events planner, said he was inspired to hosts the meals by silent breakfasts he enjoyed at a monastery in the Indian Buddhist pilgrimage city of Bodh Gaya."Punishment for talking was having one’s plate... removed and placed on a bench outside, where loudmouths could finish their meals....
Maria Usbeck, a 28-year-old freelance art director from Williamsburg, tried to make her companion laugh by turning her napkin into a paper airplane and sailing it from one knee to the other.
Three women celebrating a 30th birthday developed such elaborate pantomimes that they were able to have a fully silent conversation....
Some diners tried to pantomime what they were having, like this woman miming the gills of a fish.
Well, hell! You go in search of meditative, religionish quietude and you find yourself in the presence of mimes. The named violators of the spirit of the thing were all females, interestingly. Possible theories: 1. Women are just soooo verbal. 2. Only women were willing to give their names to the reporter. 3. It was mostly only women who were attracted to this event in the first place. 4. Men are better at following rules. 5. The reporter, a man, sought out women to talk to. 6. Happenstance.
Ms. Usbeck, who felt she might break into speech before dessert arrived, used the opportunity to give herself a pep talk in the bathroom mirror — “only a mental pep talk,” she promised — in which she stared herself down and told herself “You can do this.”
Pep talk in the mirror.
Mental pep talk in the mirror. What was the function of the mirror?
“At first it felt like being 50 and married,” said Bianca Alvarez, a 33-year-old creative director from Williamsburg. “But then it became good, the good kind of quiet.”
Because being 50 and married can't be good. Thanks, creative director lady. Thanks for the spilling from your you-must-think-it's-creative mind.
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