Snooping, prying, nosing around

Question

Dialogue:- Are you looking for something?- No. Just nosing around (snooping, prying...)I would like to know the verb that is less offensive, in the sense that he was just looking around the room with curiosity, without malice.

Gamboler · Accepted Answer

Or maybe... is it better sniffing out or sniffing around?

Fivejedjon · Answer

Who is speaking, and in what context? Is the speaker in a friend's room, a detective on the scene of a crime, or something else?

Gamboler · Answer

He is not a detective.
He isn't in a friend's room.
Apparently he's just looking around for curiosity, opening windows, drawers, etc. (He doesn't want the other man to think he is acting in a wicked way)

Fivejedjon · Answer

gambolerHe is not a detective.He isn't in a friend's room.

Where is he then? And who is the other man? This information affects the answer.

AlpheccaStars · Answer

- Are you looking for something?
- No. Just curious. / Just looking around.

Gamboler · Answer

Ok, fivejedjon. I didn't imagine it was so difficult to answer my question.

The man who is snooping (or prying, nosing around, poking around, sniffing out, sniffing around...) is a new guest in a boarding house. He doesn't want to arouse suspicions.
The man who asks him "Are you looking for something?" is the boyfriend of the girl who owns the boarding house.
The conversation is taken from a movie released in 1957.

Fivejedjon · Answer

Then AS's suggestions are as good as any. I don't know what happened in the film, but most people in the boyfriend's  place would have been displeased at the behaviour of the man. It is not acceptable to open drawers in somebody else's house whatever words you use for it.

Gamboler · Answer

Caught as he was, he justifies his strange behaviour saying that he was born in this house before it was bought by the woman and converted in a boarding house. But what I wanted to know here is the best verb among the aforementioned that he can use to justify that he is not trying to steal anything, just being curious. I suspect that all of the verbs have similar meanings, but maybe a native could find a slight difference that I couldn't guess. And of course, as you said, the boyfriend is very displeased when he sees the guest opening the windows, searching in the drawers, cupboards, etc.

Ten minutes ago, I phoned a friend from Ireland living in Barcelona and he told me that in this case he would use poking around, because it doesn't imply bad behaviour and makes the stranger less suspicious to the boyfriend. Do you agree?

Gamboler · Answer

What about using "Just for the sake of curiosity" Does this sentence arouse less suspicions?

Fivejedjon · Answer

gambolerHe doesn't want to arouse suspicions.

This sound as though he is trying to hide something.

I'm afraid that the whole situation seems slightly surreal to me. If he is genuinely not trying to pry into things that do not concern him, then why is he opening drawers? If he is aware that what he is doing is unacceptable, then he should not be doing it. This seems to me to have little to do with language, unless he knows that he is doing something wrong and is trying to find excuse for it..

Snooping, prying, nosing around

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