Moments

I shall segment my day into "moments" to make it easy for you, my reader.

My moment of near-charity:
Today, there were many people dressed in orange, holding familiar tin cans with stickers attached to the rims. They were NTU students raising funds for those underprivileged students in financial difficulty. Alright, fair enough. I thought the cause was just. But the annoying thing was, they were standing at the top of escalators, in MRT stations and EVERYWHERE that people were. Ok, so you ought to stand in strategic locations. BUT it's peak office hour and people are RUSHING to work. It's terribly annoying to have orange people in your way when there are hundreds of us, groggy and not-yet-awake and trying to get to the office on time. So anyway, that was that. At about 3.30pm, I left the office to go run an errand in town. I walked out to the MRT station and lo and behold - Orange Guy. Seeing as I was the only one walking in that direction, Orange Guy smiled sweetly and looked at me with puppy dog eyes (I suspect they're all trained to do that). And get this, he says nothing. NOTHING. He just pushes the tin in my direction. So, being nice, I asked where the money was gonna go. And that's when I found out about the needy students. Ok, I was moved. Enough to reach into my bag for my wallet. Now inside my wallet was (among many other useless things) a 50 dollar note and 60 cents. I was moved, but not moved enough to give $50. But I also thought that giving 60 cents was bull. I mean, c'mon, these tins aren't for you to get rid of your loose change. These tins are for you to do your bit and give with a cheerful heart. So I told Orange Guy I was coming back later and if he was still around, I'd have smaller notes by then and would give him some money. He very nicely thanked me and that was that.

So I went to town, ran my errand, then went to Marks and Sparks to buy something so I would have notes to give Orange Guy. Came back to Raffles Place but Orange Guy wasn't there anymore. In his place was Orange Guy 2. Orange Guy 2 didn't do anything. He just stood there with his tin and didn't even approach anyone for donations. Look, if you're not going to put in some effort to ask people if they woud kindly donate, I'm not gonna give you anything. I mean, it's not that I'm being an awful person. I just thought that he should have been more proactive. So I just walked right past him. I guess I should've just plonked some money in his tin anyway but I just didn't feel that he was trying. To me, it was like he was just expecting people to walk up to him and put money in his tin. I may support charities and donation drives but I sure want to know where my money's gonna go. I don't just give blindly. Especially since I try not to give coins. It's not that I wouldn't give. I just want my money to be channelled to the right places and used wisely. That way, I can feel good about having helped someone. And if you don't approach me, my legs won't automatically lead me to you. Really.

My "Do you take 'no' for an answer?" moment:
While I was in town, I was approached my a young chap conducting surveys. I don't know which company hired him but the survey he was conducting was the same one I did a YEAR ago. Either this company is inefficient or they want the WHOLE of Singapore and Southeast Asia to answer their questions. So anyway, Young Chap comes up to me as I'm at the traffic lights. He goes, "ExcusemecanItakeaminuteofyourtimewhichshoppingcentredoyoulikethemost?" For a split second, I was like, "Huh?? Are you even asking me a question??" Good thing I'm Singaporean and I could make out his bullet train soliloquy. By then, the light had turned green and I was ready to cross the road. I hurriedly said, "er.... Takashimaya" and started crossing. He said, "ok, I'll cross with you." Next question:

Young Chap: Are you single, married or attached?
Me: Single.
Young Chap: Er, single?
Me: Yes.
Young Chap: You're single. Do you have a boyfriend? No boyfriend?
Me: NO. (Which part of SINGLE do you not understand, my dear 14 year-old boy? And why are you not in school and out here terrorizing people with your faster-than-a-speeding-train speech?)

Before you all start thinking that he asked the "do you have a boyfriend?" question in an interested way, I can assure you, he did not. He just didn't understand "single" very well. Probably because he didn't think anyone my age could still be single. Hahaha... :)

My unglam moments:
Um, ok, they're not really very unglam but they made me a teeny bit embarrassed (like how Young Chap's incredulous, "No boyfriend??" made me feel a bit embarrassed too). On my way to work in the morning, I was carrying my funky bottle of water (mentioned in a previous entry). If you know my routine, I try to change fingers cos the bottle's quite heavy. In the midst of changing, the bottle slipped and landed on the floor of the train with a THUD. Worse, the top flipped open and water spurted out. AND, the bottle actually landed near the foot of this lady, whose boyfriend stared (almost glared) at me. Ok, sorry I nearly amputated your girlfriend's foot with my water bottle, mister. It's not like I did it on purpose so the whole train could stare at me. Sigh, I had to bend down, close the cover and pick the bottle up as calmly as possible, all the while pretending nothing happened and this was a normal routine. Sigh.

Second unglam moment was in town, somewhere in Takashimaya (my supposedly favourite shopping centre [it's not really]) where I almost slipped. The floor was completely dry except for this glorious patch I just had to put my foot on. Whee! My foot went way forward before the rest of my body could. Thank God for arms that steady you when you attempt to slip. Didn't fall but the little dance I sorta did should have been entertainment enough for the people who saw it.

Ok, I think that's enough moments for the day. If you wanna know what happened to my bottle (you probably don't but I just want to say it anyway), I brought it back without it ever having touched my lips. Yup, full bottle. What a waste of my energy!