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30 Times Unaware People Challenged Someone That Was Actually An Expert In That Subject Matter, But Realized It Too Late
It's hard to imagine a more rewarding experience than being challenged to something by a person who doesn't know you're an expert at it. It's right up there with bringing a child into this world and becoming the first person to walk on the Moon.
Recently, a redditor who goes by the nickname Struedolf asked people who were in this position to tell their stories and oh boy, did they respond! From an archer forced to compete with a bow and arrows to a construction worker blamed for property damage, these are just a few priceless examples of the nearly 23K responses Struedolf's post has received. Scroll down to check out more and don't forget to upvote your faves!
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#1
I guy I went on a date with tried to serenade me with his okay piano skills. He was incredibly patronizing to me and tried to explain to me what the notes were even when I told him I’m also a pianist. So after his endless explanations I asked him to move over on the bench so I can try to play. I’m a two time Carnegie Hall pianist. He never called me back afterwards. Worth it!
Struedolf decided to ask redditors this question after something like this happened to them. To Struedolf's delight, they were on the delivering end. "I didn't really expect my post to receive this much attention so I was kind of shocked," Struedolf told Bored Panda.
However, the abundance of comments made it clear that it's a topic people want to brag about. And why wouldn't they? If someone spends 10,000 hours perfecting a craft and it brought them a pleasurable moment, it's their right to tell the Internet about it.
RELATED:
#2
A buddy mine was at a concert in bad seats and started complaining about it via twitter. All of a sudden the band starts reading some tweets and calls my friend up to sit on stage for a couple songs. They sit him at the piano and during the next song, they jokingly go "ok piano solo!" The crowd laughs for a second but then my buddy just starts jamming out, as he plays piano in his band. Talk about dream moment getting to play with your favorite band
"Reading the stories really was an amazing experience," Struedolf said. "It was really fun to go through everyone's responses and if there was anything I took away from it, it would be to not challenge people to something not knowing how good they are at it."
So there you have it, folks. If you want to establish your dominance by competing with somebody, at least try to figure out beforehand if it's not you who's going to be mopped.
#3
I was a competitive swimmer for 14 years, including 4 years of NCAA, but I'm on the shorter side so people don't assume I was any good.
Was at a friends house on a lake one summer, and a macho guy challenged me to race to a buoy in the middle of the lake, to prove... something, I guess. The lake is deceptively large, about a half mile across, so I warned him that if he isn't a strong swimmer it could be dangerous.
He was running out of gas after about 2 minutes, so I offered to let him off the hook, but he insisted he would finish. I went to the buoy and was swimming back when I found him floundering, so I lifeguard swam him back to the house. His ego took a deserved hit that day.
Don't get cocky around water, even if you think you're a strong swimmer.
#4
I’m a teacher so people try to tell me how to do my job all the time (parents, kids, politicians, etc). How’d it turn out? Welcome to my world, f**kers. Home schooling is a b****, isn’t it? Your kids are kind of horrible, aren’t they? Lessons aren’t that easy to plan, are they?
Meanwhile, I’m drinking a beer at 10am while grading the assignments I posted last week.
SoozeeQ 4 years ago
For all of you who are hating on the OP. Click on link under post (Motocrossx23). It will take you to the original reddit site, where he explains further that this is satirical. Here's a quote from him: "Parents, this was meant to be satirical: please do not think for a second that we as teachers do not appreciate and sympathize with you all during this ordeal, especially those who are working still!"
#5
When working as a teacher I beat a lot of students in Pokémon battles, cause they didn't think of me being like 15 years ahead of them in fighting experience. Noobs
#6
Wasn’t me, but there’s a story about an old geotechnical engineer who used to work for the company I work for.
Several senior staff had to attend a meeting with the client, and some government regulatory staff who were being awkward and not approving the design.
This geotech guy is pretty much quiet the whole meeting. Throughout the discussion, the government guy keeps referencing this research document and shooting down anything anybody suggests.
Near the end of the meeting geotech asks government guy if he has the research paper with him. He responds yes and places it on the table.
Geotech asks government guy who is the author of the paper? Then slides over a business card. Turns out it’s geotechs own paper that government guy has been referencing to defend his argument.
Government guy went bright red and apparently approved the design the same day
#7
A neighbor on my block in Brooklyn challenged me to a pizza bake-off. I recently catered pizza for my daughters school and word got around the neighborhood my pizza was pretty darn good. My first thought was, "this guy is a Brooklyn native, my pizza will be s**te compared to his!" But there was something about him bragging that I couldn't resist the challenge. He talked up how pizza was in his blood, how his dad ran the pizza place around the corner years ago. I remained silent and let my skills answer for themselves. I got a buddy to let us use one of Baker's Pride ovens at his restaurant. We even had total strangers try our pizzas. Every last person chose my pizza over his. I never mentioned to him that I've worked in pizza places almost every day for the last thirty years. I never mentioned that when I'm not working at a pizza place I'm making pizzas at home at least once every two days. I never mentioned that at nine years old I knew that I wanted to be a pizza man. Here I am 45 and getting ready to start my own pizza business.
#8
Not me but a while back a guy I knew from church growing up posted on facebook something about Crusades and medieval Christianity. A girl responded and gave x, y, z reasons why he was wrong. The guy responded back with you don't know what you are talking about, you need to do your research and linked couple of youtube links of armchair historians/pastors. She hits him back with a dozen or so academic sources and let him know that she was 3 years in a PhD program studying medieval history.
#9
I once challenged a girl who was a friend to foosball, not knowing she grew up with a table in her house and older brothers. I even, jokingly, put money on the game. Well I learned a bit about humility that night.. the icing on the cake was when she drove me to an atm to get her the money
#10
My wife and I were taking an evening cruise for adults in Portsmouth Bay. The ship drove around the shipyard, where my submarine and several others were stationed. My wife and I are having a quiet drink when a really loud know it all starts spouting misinformation about each submarine we are driving by. Calling them all the wrong class, wrong names, etc. When he literally points to my submarine and says "and that is a 637 class" my wife finally speaks up and says "actually that is a 688" . The guy gets all gruff and says "well how would you know?". My wife smiles, hugs my arm and says sweetly "That's my husbands submarine, it is the Minneapolis St Paul, SNN-708." He turned beat red while his date laughed.
#11
I once went to a museum with my sister and her friend, who I hadn't met before. We got to the Greek art bit and her friend started telling me how she was super into Greek myth, and I thought that was cool, because I was, unbeknownst to her, doing a Master's in it at the time and also keeping a blog of myth retellings, which was pretty popular, and it was a relief to have something in common with this stranger.
She then got weirdly haughty and told me she probably knew more myths than I did, so, being polite, I didn't challenge her on it and just asked her to tell me her favourite, so that we could have a conversation about it.
She proceeded to tell me the myth of Daedalus and the minotaur. I asked her how she'd heard of that one, because it's fairly obscure. She told me she'd read it on a viral blog post on a blog about mythology.
It was my blog.
Alex Fierro 4 years ago
Huh, is the myth of Daedalus and the minotaur really obscure? I've seen it pop up in a bunch of places.
#12
Co worker - “I’m pretty good at running, I run every day. I could probably beat you in a marathon.”
They didn’t know I used to be a pro runner. Ran under 14 minutes in the 5k, sub 29 in the 10k, and under 15 hours for 100 miles on trails. Won a national title even.
So I agreed to run with them and jumped in the local marathon with no training. I took the prize purse and made myself a few hundred bucks and took everyone out for beers with it. Was an interesting next Monday at work.
#13
Astronomer here! So if we were to just meet on the street, you probably wouldn't guess I was a scientist (I am a woman who enjoys dresses when the weather is nice), and this was doubly true when I was a few years younger in my 20s and single. Especially at bars.
So at the end of college I was doing a summer internship in Mountain View, California where if you went out there'd be a lot of Google boys who would literally sometimes wear "Google" shirts so you'd know they're extra obnoxious. I remember getting stuck chatting with one, and when he asked my major he sneered with the "do you really know the subject?" attitude. And ask me if I knew how the Heisenberg Uncertainty principle was. And when I explained his 20 questions, said "it's probably not so hard because they go easy on women because they don't want to scare them off."
Then he proceeded to tell me about a lecture he attended in Mountain View that he'd been lucky enough to visit, as a Google employee, by Jill Tarter who runs the SETI Institute. And proceeded to tell me about the Allen Telescope Array they were building in northern California because I "might not know about it."
I gave him a minute for his spiel but then said I actually was working for Jill that summer at the SETI Institute, on interference mitigation for the Allen Telescope Array. And did he want to hear what she was really like, or see some pictures from the ATA site? I'd also just met Frank Drake, and he was really nice!
Oh man, was that guy not happy! But hey at least he stopped talking to me like right after.
#14
Not me but my brother & best friend. We were in Baltimore for a baseball weekend in 2009 and hanging out at a bar across from Camden yards. They had a Silver Strike bowling video game. At our local bar back in Boston we had one as well. I’m decent at the game but my brother and buddy were F**king amazing at this game. Bowling 300 games and what not. So two dudes are playing this game and drinking. We ask them if we can play when they’re done. They ask if we want to play them. We said sure. My brother and buddy destroy these guys. Like it wasn’t even close. These dudes said it was a fluke and they wanted a rematch but this time for a round of beers. Again, annihilation city. But they kept wanting to play, to eventually win a game. No lie, after THIRTEEN ROUNDS OF BEERS they finally gave up. They were great guys. We saw them the next day at the same bar and they walked up to Us with beers in hand already and said “rematch”. To this day we still hang out with them whenever we go to Baltimore. And to this day, they have never won.
#15
Went with a big group of college students to a bar. I was challenged by a cute little girl (and by that I mean she was maybe 95lbs, 4'11") to a drink contest with a pint of beer. I'm 6'1", 200lbs, so I just chuckled and agreed to it.
It seems like I had just enough time to tilt my head back to start chugging when I hear her empty glass hit the table. Turns out she had the ability to just open her throat and pour the beer down.
We dated for about six months after that. Seriously.
#16
Someone at a bar bet me there were only 30 days in a particular month. $20 if I could prove them wrong right then (pre-cellphone days). I was born on the 31st of that month, showed them my drivers license
#17
Mine’s kind of dumb, but I think it still counts. At work I’m kind of the Google Sheets “expert” and I make lots of tools for different departments to use. Enter “new guy” who needed to collect, aggregate and display a bunch of data. My boss was like, “Send Wish a calendar invite so you can tell her what you want and she’ll set it up for you.” New Guy was having none of that and insisted he was going to do it himself. Well, a week later, he finally has this s**tty sheet that doesn’t have half the information we need, and we have to have the numbers for the State by tomorrow. So my boss asks me to fix it and new guy is like, “Yeah, okay, that’s not really possible. This is is a good as it’s going to get!” Two hours later, I send them both a fully functional and automated sheet that does everything we need, and we’ll be able to use it indefinitely, which means next time (and every time) the stupid state report is due, it will already be done. New Guy was like, “I would have added that in if I’d had more time.”
#18
A local mall had a portable climbing wall with a “make it to the top and win $100” side. The route was actually pretty challenging. As I walked by the guy asked me if I’d like to try “nobody has made it to the top, you think you can do it buddy”
At the time I was ranked top 12 climber in my age group and kind of laughed to myself.
After taking my $100 I then proceeded to call the rest of my climbing team and one by one they went to the mall and claimed their $100
After the 4th person they guy got suspicious and took the sign down. We later told him we were all Nationally ranked competition climbers and he got a good laugh. The company who owned the rentals was the one who lost the money, he just worked the booth and wasn’t the one who lost the prize money.
#19
Basketball.
I'm a very unassuming looking guy. 5'8", 150 pounds, not a tattoo to be found. But back in the day, I was pretty athletic and could hang in games with fringe D1/semi-pro guys. But I can't emphasize how much I didn't look like it at all.
Anyway, in college, hanging out in someone's room, it came up that I play a bit and some dude I didn't know started running his mouth about how he could destroy me. Just wouldn't stop talking. I gave him every out, until it basically became personally offensive.
Other guys were a bit tired of this ***hole hanging around, and they knew I could play, so we all trooped over to the gym, late as f**k in the dead of winter, so we could settle things.
11-0 the first game. Not sure if we played after that, but I remember it was 11-0 because I made sure to not let the guy score. And I'm a pretty mellow guy and usually would have laid off and let him score a couple when it was clear that I was better, but this guy was a real ***hole, so I just clamped down on him start to finish. I blocked a ton of his s**t.
He stopped hanging around nearly as much after that, so I was kind of a hero to the rest of the guys. Like St. Patrick. Drove that snake out of our nation.
#20
I found myself in a discussion about vaccinations with an antivaxx couple in a fkn smokers area of a bar.
I'm a scientist.
I tried every logical, emotional and personal plea but they ended up getting mad, telling me to get f**ked and walked off. My friends that heard it said I put forward a good argument and they walked away because they lost. Sucks because we all lose when they don't vaccinate their kids yeehaw
#21
My landlord tried blaming me for damage to the kitchen cabinets but didnt know that im in construction and am very familiar with home building codes.
They placed the cabinets too close to the stove and the glue that held the laminate had melted.
Carol Emory 4 years ago
I was living in a small town, driving an '84 Honda Accord I'd inherited from my brother. During a drive home from the store, the dash lights came on and the car quietly died. I knew what was wrong as the car had experienced the same problem 4 years earlier. The timing belt had slipped off the reel. I called a mechanic in town and asked them if they could come get my car and replace the timing belt and reel. He said "why would you say it was the timing belt." I explained the symptoms and how it had happened before. He proceeded to argue with me and I finally said "Just come get the car!" An hour after they got the car, I called him. "So what seems to be wrong with it?" In a meek voice he says "timing belt."
#22
My nephew challenged me to Super Smash Bros Ultimate once. Once.
Allison B. 4 years ago
When my son got a switch his uncle came over to play SSB with all of us (since he too had a switch). No one could beat this man haha, my fiance is a gamer and couldn't. Everyone in the house tried, we would even do 3 vs 1. He would take us all out, every single time... we tried this on multiple occasions... we gave up for good playing with him 😂
#23
Just graduated as a teacher and I’ve been working as a Casual Relief Teacher. I play lacrosse which is a small sport already and even smaller here in Australia. I tried out for the last World Cup team and made it to the final cut.
I was team teaching with another teacher who worked at the school. Before the period he spoke to me and said “hey mate, we are doing lacrosse today. It’s a bit of an odd sport and hard to teach so just wait over there and then you can just help with supervision and discipline.” then walked off.
Being a CRT from an agency, didn’t really know how to speak to him/speak up. I tried to speak to him and say that I played but he didn’t give me a second so I just listened and did my thing. Few minutes into the start of the lesson I grabbed a stick and ball and just started to work my around the class giving them pointers and hints.
The way he was teaching was completely incorrect and I didn’t want to say anything so when the kids broke off into groups, I kinda just taught them correctly.
He pulled me over at a drinks break and asked how I knew so much/good perform the skills. I told him how I play lacrosse and my playing history. He asked why I didn’t speak up and say anything and I said I tried to tell him.
Anyway, I ended up running the rest of the class and even ended up sitting down with him and going through the correct and easier way to teach the game and skills.
#24
People say all kinds of random s**t how weather and climate functions. I’m a meteorologist in disguise—work as a data scientist but has a Master’s and a PhD in meteorology. When I politely (and gently) inform them how things actually work, people are usually super interested to know more. But occasionally I got something like “Oh yeah?! And how do you know?” Well, I have published several papers on the matter, would love to discuss it all night. So far, they’ve all backed down after that.
#25
I’m really good at archery. My friend and I rented him a bow at the local range and he wanted to bet me beers for every round. I told him repeatedly no, you will not win. He could probably get lucky if we did one arrow shoot offs but he wanted to do proper three arrow rounds.
He insisted. I drank for free all night.
#26
My Uncle challenged Jack Nicklaus to a golf game in college, without a clue. The humiliation burns him to this day
#27
I’m not a great swimmer but there was a time when I would do laps for literally hours. I would go slowly to make sure that I had the energy to do the time I wanted to. This kid challenged me to race. I left him so far behind it was funny. He though he was about to humiliate me in front of his friends.
#28
Some Japanese client that studied in France asked me for a translation job but wanted to change all my sentences to prove she was better than me at my own mother tongue. She ended up writing something grammatically correct but that sounded so horribly sexual that if you tried and googled the terms you would only find porn and erotic novels. I had to tell my boss she was forcing me to write porn (because it was for a mascara brand that was supposed to be sold in France) so he could stop her and after that she stopped trying to best me
#29
Chess. I'm a Chess master. I think when people hear that they're like 'oh he's really good at chess', but what it means is that I've played in international tournaments and beaten other masters and some governing body has given me a title.
Anyway, I get challenged a lot by friends who think they're pretty good. What they don't realize is that your average 'pretty good' player is getting destroyed by your average tournament player. And your average tournament player is getting destroyed by a master.
Amparo Rodriguez Bogosian 4 years ago
My bf plays chess (1900 or so) and he's always reading, learning and watching matches to improve his play. He even tried to teach me... only when I met him I realized that knowing how to move the pieces doesn't mean you know how to play.
#30
While not a pro, I'm pretty darn good at poker. The church I was at had a Poker night and I was just going to watch. They insisted I join the 25 cent game.
Came home with $200 and they decided to never have a poker night again.
What do you think ?
Miklós Nagy 4 years ago
It wasn't even a week since I had an argument with someone on facebook under a covid-19 article. In the end (after I linked her several research) she claimed she is right, because she graduated as a medical doctor. On facebook. Where I saw her profile saying she is confectioner. She sure hadn't checked mine which says I have a master degree from biotechnology...
blugeagua 4 years ago
It’s especially annoying when it’s the attitude of men treating women like that. Some guys just don’t see women as human beings for some reason and don’t think we can be as good in the STEM world, again for some strange reason.
Korrie Broos 4 years ago
I have a friend that is a retired Admiral, he took warships around the world etc. But for civilian boats, the navy qualifications do not apply, so if you want a have a small skiboat etc, you need to get a new licence. He ended up sitting thru all the classes about radio procedures, weather, etc etc without any one of the lecturers knowing about his previous naval qualifications. And the civilian exams are not as strict as the naval exams.
Daria B 4 years ago
This one sounds like me, an Istrian, taking beginner level Italian classes in my graduate year in university in Korea. Italian is literally my native language (besides Croatian). But, what could I do... Had to satisfy the curriculum of obligatory subjects, so....
Load More Replies... Miklós Nagy 4 years ago
It wasn't even a week since I had an argument with someone on facebook under a covid-19 article. In the end (after I linked her several research) she claimed she is right, because she graduated as a medical doctor. On facebook. Where I saw her profile saying she is confectioner. She sure hadn't checked mine which says I have a master degree from biotechnology...
blugeagua 4 years ago
It’s especially annoying when it’s the attitude of men treating women like that. Some guys just don’t see women as human beings for some reason and don’t think we can be as good in the STEM world, again for some strange reason.
Korrie Broos 4 years ago
I have a friend that is a retired Admiral, he took warships around the world etc. But for civilian boats, the navy qualifications do not apply, so if you want a have a small skiboat etc, you need to get a new licence. He ended up sitting thru all the classes about radio procedures, weather, etc etc without any one of the lecturers knowing about his previous naval qualifications. And the civilian exams are not as strict as the naval exams.
Daria B 4 years ago
This one sounds like me, an Istrian, taking beginner level Italian classes in my graduate year in university in Korea. Italian is literally my native language (besides Croatian). But, what could I do... Had to satisfy the curriculum of obligatory subjects, so....
Load More Replies... Related on Bored Panda
