In your own country, it's easy to make assumptions about people

Host: The afternoon rain had softened the edges of the city, turning the streets into mirrors that reflected passing umbrellas and half-seen faces. The café window fogged faintly from the warmth inside, where the hum of conversation carried the familiar music of class and assumption — tones polished by education, laughter filtered through etiquette.

At a small table by the window sat Jack, his coat still damp, his voice carrying the gravel of the working man he was proud not to disguise. Across from him, Jeeny stirred her cappuccino, the foam trembling beneath her spoon. Outside, a street musician played a tune that was too beautiful to belong to someone ignored.

Jeeny: (gently) “Rebecca Front once said — ‘In your own country, it’s easy to make assumptions about people based on accents, about areas based on architecture.’”

Jack: (grinning dryly) “Yeah, and she was being polite. People don’t just make assumptions — they build whole damn hierarchies out of them.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But those hierarchies are invisible until you start listening.”

Jack: “Or until you open your mouth and say the wrong vowel.”

Host: The steam from Jack’s cup curled upward, fragile and temporary, like the space between his bitterness and her calm. Outside, the rain thickened again, each droplet striking the glass like punctuation.

Jeeny: “Accents are history you carry in your voice. It’s the geography of your tongue. You can’t shed it — not really.”

Jack: “No, but you can be punished for it. You grow up speaking one way, and suddenly it decides which doors open and which ones don’t.”

Jeeny: “So you change how you speak?”

Jack: “I tried once. Didn’t fit right. Felt like wearing someone else’s face.”

Jeeny: “Then you did the right thing by keeping your own.”

Host: She smiled — not pity, not condescension, just understanding. The kind of smile that acknowledges a shared truth, even from different worlds.

Jack: “You know, people think class disappeared with coal mines and calloused hands. But all it did was swap uniforms — accents for architecture. You can tell a postcode by the paint job.”

Jeeny: “And assumptions become shortcuts. The architecture of judgment.”

Jack: “Exactly. You walk past glass towers, and people inside look down — literally and figuratively. Step into an old brick block, and everyone assumes failure before you even open the door.”

Jeeny: “That’s the tragedy of familiarity — we mistake patterns for people.”

Host: The rain slowed, the sound now a whisper. A bus rolled by, its reflection blurring in the puddle, the faces inside ghostlike — commuters, dreamers, all invisible to one another.

Jack: “You ever notice how people soften their accent at job interviews?”

Jeeny: “Of course. It’s a kind of survival. We all code-switch — smooth the edges, hide the roots.”

Jack: “And in doing that, we erase ourselves — bit by bit.”

Jeeny: “Sometimes survival costs authenticity. But sometimes it buys access.”

Jack: (shaking his head) “Access shouldn’t have an accent.”

Jeeny: “It always has, Jack. In every country, every class. The sound of your words tells people how much they should listen.”

Jack: “Or whether they should at all.”

Host: The light in the café shifted — afternoon giving way to early evening. Shadows deepened around them. The faint smell of rain-wet pavement drifted through the open door as someone came in — a man in a suit, speaking quickly, confidently, every word polished like marble.

Jack: “You hear that? He sounds expensive.”

Jeeny: (smiling) “And you sound real.”

Jack: “Yeah, but he gets the promotion.”

Jeeny: “True. But you get the truth.”

Host: The barista turned up the radio, the announcer’s voice crisp, perfectly neutral — that trained tone that belonged nowhere and everywhere. Jeeny tilted her head toward the sound.

Jeeny: “That’s the irony, isn’t it? We spend our lives chasing neutrality — the accent that offends no one, belongs to no place. But belonging is the point.”

Jack: “You ever think neutrality’s just another word for invisibility?”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But in some rooms, invisibility keeps you safe.”

Jack: “And in others, it erases you completely.”

Host: A small silence bloomed between them — comfortable but heavy, like a shared memory neither wanted to name. Outside, a child laughed, splashing through puddles, her accent pure and bright — untainted by judgment, untrained by fear.

Jeeny: “You know, Rebecca Front’s right — we assume too easily. We build walls from words, cities from prejudice. But if you stay long enough to listen, you realize every voice carries both history and hope.”

Jack: “History and hope. That’s poetic.”

Jeeny: “No. That’s survival.”

Host: She finished her drink and looked out at the street, where the rain had stopped and the world glistened like it had been scrubbed clean.

Jack: “So what’s the answer, then? Speak louder? Softer? Change the architecture or the accent?”

Jeeny: “Neither. You change the listening. Teach people to hear without judging.”

Jack: “You think that’s possible?”

Jeeny: “Only if we stop mistaking difference for danger.”

Jack: (nodding slowly) “And stop thinking walls make us safer.”

Jeeny: “They never do. They just make the silence echo louder.”

Host: The camera would pull back now, through the fogged glass of the café, the city outside shimmering under the dimming sky. The crowd moved like a single heartbeat — voices of every tone, cadence, and class overlapping, clashing, creating a kind of living symphony.

And beneath that soft chaos, Rebecca Front’s words resonated — clear, steady, timeless:

That accent is not hierarchy,
and architecture is not destiny.

That every wall we build
— in speech, in stone, in mind —
shrinks the world a little more.

And that the measure of a civilization
is not in how it speaks,
but in how deeply it listens —

to every tone, every tongue,
every story still brave enough
to be heard.