Non-Folders Reactions to Your Origami

[bflame7]

Luckily, most of the responses that I have got have been positive. Generally the comments range from "That's amazing! " to "How do you have the patience for that?"
I enjoy the look they give me when I tell them how many units are in a modular I'm working on, or how many steps there are in the arthropod I'm folding.
Oh, and with tessellations, no one EVER believes that it can can be made out of 1 piece of paper. I end up having to unfold it.

[Baltorigamist]

I find that oddly amusing, actually. I mean, you'd think with tessellations, it'd be easy to see that it's one sheet since there are no gaps. Something like the Ryujin or an urchin I can understand, cus there are a lot of points and flaps, but a tessellation?

Back on topic: I think I've posted here before, but it's usually some variation of "You did that with paper? O_O". Others call it things I'm not going to repeat here.

[kareshi]

People don't like that I use glue/wires/tape to keep a ryujn together. Now that I have Kamiya's Super Complex book, I have a source to cite that it's acceptable!

[Harpseal]

I've got a new one! Responses from the very elderly are usually nicer than those of classmates, but often a bit strange e.g.
"That's a fearsome looking injun!"
"It's very pretty......"
"You're not tricking me into thinking that's paper!"
"That's lovely sewing, did you do it with the thread i bought you?"
I hope i don't sound mean to old people or anything, i don't mean to be if that's what it sounds like.

[Langko]

At school I fold a lot of simpler models in my free periods. I don't have any good paper at school so they are always folded from copy paper or paper from a note pad. As a result the completed models look rubbish but people are still amazed at the result. I then proceed to tell them that they are not really that good. Then the next question I get asked is "we'll then, what is good?". I then show them some pictures from my Flickr and they are blown away. They have a hard time believing that I actually made it and that they are from 1 piece of paper.

[Harpseal]

Everyone else's schoolmates seem to be nicer than mine.
We once did origami as part of a maths lesson. At the end of the lesson, 70% of the class declared they never wanted to do it again.
We'd only made kites and diamonds out of a4, and a rotating wreath of 4 octohedron (also from 4 pieces of a4).

[FoldSkate]

Most people at my school really like my origami. Lots of girls ask me to make roses and people always try to steal whatever I make during in class (I think this is a compliment). I made my Japanese teacher all kinds of stuff like the swordsman, or Kamiya's crane, and he says a bunch of stuff in Japanese about it. I don't think I've ever got a negative comment except once. I had made Brian chan's marijuana leaf from tissue foil, and I was told it looks like a crumpled the paper into shape. I agree with this comment though haha

[Harpseal]

People seem to like it more when i do something modular.
After making a pinwheel/frisbee, i was surprised to hear gasps of amazement, and the question "can i throw it?"
I made one of them out of really sturdy paper at home. The only thing that made any flaps come out was when i threw it down the stairs and it hit the ceiling.

[Carsen]

When I fold at school, I mainly just precrease a grid for a tessellation so I can focus on what is being said and not the paper. But whenever someone asks what I am making, it is really difficult to explain. How do you all explain what you are making if it is something abstract?

[FoldSkate]

When people ask what I'm making I just say I don't know haha.
Usually if I try to explain that I'm just testing some hard molecules or just an area of a model people get confused. The only person who understands my tests is my girlfriend, who owns more of my origami than I do. So far she has 2 eagles by cuong, komatsus lion, andreys Moai, a heart with wings, and kamiyas Phoenix.
Some new reactions I have gotten lately are, "can it fly?" *throws it*
"How do people come up with these?"
"Is this folded from a gum wrapper?"
Or sometimes people just dismiss what I made and ask me to come with them at lunch.
And for some reason all my friends think my bag of methylcellulose is cocaine

[origami_8]

And for some reason all my friends think my bag of methylcellulose is cocaine

That's the reason Gerwin and I don't ever take MC with us to conventions. We fear if there is a luggage inspection on the airport, we would have a hard time explaining that this is actually just wallpaper glue.

[FoldSkate]

That's hilarious! Yeah, I think they would confiscate it even if they knew it wasn't drugs. I don't know about airports out of the country, but here I can't even bring a ham sandwhich.

Oh just remembered another one! In seventh grade I made this playboy bunny by Andrey Lukanov for this girl I liked. I gave it to her at the boys and girls club and later she left it on a table and we went outside for a bit. When we came back in it was gone and we found out that a worker threw it away because it was inappropriate ?? I was so mad. I spent atleast 3 hours on it.

[TheUnChosenOne]

I got one!
So I was folding this hang glider for my teacher as a present and i was already getting into shaping the head and arms and stuff and this kid comes and asks "is that a plane?"

not everything made from paper is a plane! GEEZES does this LOOK like a plane to you!?

ANYWAYS i hate it when people ask me some really dumb questions about origami (especially if its just a common sense question, not an origami question)

[cowburger13]

I hate how when I say I do origami someone will say, "Oh really? My five year old also does! He loves those flapping birds!". Origami is often thought of as flapping birds and simple models, so it really bugs me when stuff like this happens.

[TheUnChosenOne]

yes, that's exactly what i mean. especially when you are folding something kind of simple (for example no good paper at hand) and you can't tell them that you can do better because you don't have your paper :\