Some things happen in your life for a brief moment and it leaves you wondering. Could it be true?
I was with a friend at a lunch appointment couple of weeks back and in the middle of our discussion, this Indian guy walks up to us, and gestures an apology for interrupting. We both stopped and turned to look at him, expecting him to ask for directions or something along those lines. He was pretty young, probably in his mid 30s. Tall, well dressed in a short sleeved shirt and a pair of khaki pants.
All of a sudden, he bursts out in tears, and starts asking, no begging us to help him. In between tears, I could make out that he was from India, couldn't get which part, and that he came to Singapore to find work not too long ago. And then he's stricken with kidney failure. At this point, he lifts up his shirt to reveal a urine bag with a tube that leads to I don't know where. He kept asking us to check him because he's genuine. And then he shows us this medicine pack from Raffles Medical Hospital, saying that he cannot afford the medication. It's too expensive and he doesn't know what to do. Then he tells us he needs money for medicine, while chocking back his words with his tears.
I didn't know what to say. I looked at my friend and my friend looked back blankly. Then I started to tear.
There have been cases where people have come up to me and asked for money for food, and when I tell them to sit with me and order what ever they like on my tab, they leave. So is this genuine? Fortunately, the friend that I was having lunch with was a doctor, and he told this man that he can't offer him money but he could offer him a packet of the medication that he needed. The man told us, he doesn't need money. He needs money for the medication, and that if we could get him the medication, he doesn't need money from us. I felt it was a genuine case. Is it? So we told him to wait outside the restaurant because we were in the middle of a business discussion, and that we would take him to get the medication when we were finished.
Intermittently, this man would walk into the restaurant to look for us again. I'm not sure he understood that he had to wait till our discussion was over. Maybe we didn't make ourselves clear enough, that my friend was a doctor and if you could just wait, you could have your medication. When we were finally done with our discussion about another hour later, he had left. Very unfortunate because my friend had already called in and had the medication prepared already. So, was it genuine? He was okay not to receive money if he had the medication.
I don't think I'll ever be able to find out, unless I meet this Indian man again. If I ever do meet him again. I'm not sure if this was a set up or a hoax, but I'm sure that there are genuine cases like that with people who really need help but are not receiving the help that they need, and just knowing this fact breaks my heart.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Friday, February 11, 2011
If we were eggs...
Coped a picture from a friend of mine after realising it depicts Julien and I spot on!!! Julien's white and pale as usual even though he's always wanting to be in the sun, and I'm usually a new shade of tan after every 30 mins even though I keep myself away from the sun!!! LOL!!!!!
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Funny Bus Incident
Something really funny happened today on the way to work that I just HAVE to share!
I was on the way to work this morning, and as usual I take the bus from my block to the train station. The thing about these buses in the morning, is they like and tend to break very abruptly. When this happens, I'm normally holding on to the rail handle and would be able to stop myself from flying to the end of the bus.
This morning however, I was busy doing some work on my phone and was not really paying attention to my surroundings. So you'd have guessed that when the bus did an emergency break, I literally ran from the back of the bus, to the front where there's a small protruding wall. This would have been great to break my inertia, had there not been a guy there. But he was, and you should've seen his FACE as I was running top speed towards him! He clearly wanted to get out of the way by wanting to back up away from me, but there was that wall behind him and so he kept pushing himself backwards against the wall, yet he wasn't out of the way, and I was running closer by the milli-second. He looked like he literally saw death in the face.
I finally managed to break my fall by slamming my hand against the same wall beside that poor man's head with a loud thud, this obviously left only a couple of inches between this man and myself. At that point, he struggled even more to push himself against the wall waving his arms about with BOTH his eyes closed! He had his mouth wide open, almost like he was screaming only there was no sound. Silent scream??
I couldn't help but literally burst out laughing then, and since I was only inches away from him, spat some of my saliva at him in the process... This made me laugh even harder while I also turned red from embarrassment. At that same moment, I reached my stopped, and the bus door slammed open. So I ran down still laughing only turned around to see that the guy had not moved from his spot and was still staring wide eyed into space, not able to understand yet, what just happened.
Weird!!!
I was on the way to work this morning, and as usual I take the bus from my block to the train station. The thing about these buses in the morning, is they like and tend to break very abruptly. When this happens, I'm normally holding on to the rail handle and would be able to stop myself from flying to the end of the bus.
This morning however, I was busy doing some work on my phone and was not really paying attention to my surroundings. So you'd have guessed that when the bus did an emergency break, I literally ran from the back of the bus, to the front where there's a small protruding wall. This would have been great to break my inertia, had there not been a guy there. But he was, and you should've seen his FACE as I was running top speed towards him! He clearly wanted to get out of the way by wanting to back up away from me, but there was that wall behind him and so he kept pushing himself backwards against the wall, yet he wasn't out of the way, and I was running closer by the milli-second. He looked like he literally saw death in the face.
I finally managed to break my fall by slamming my hand against the same wall beside that poor man's head with a loud thud, this obviously left only a couple of inches between this man and myself. At that point, he struggled even more to push himself against the wall waving his arms about with BOTH his eyes closed! He had his mouth wide open, almost like he was screaming only there was no sound. Silent scream??
I couldn't help but literally burst out laughing then, and since I was only inches away from him, spat some of my saliva at him in the process... This made me laugh even harder while I also turned red from embarrassment. At that same moment, I reached my stopped, and the bus door slammed open. So I ran down still laughing only turned around to see that the guy had not moved from his spot and was still staring wide eyed into space, not able to understand yet, what just happened.
Weird!!!
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