Politeness is the art of choosing among one's real thoughts.
Abel Stevens – (1815-1897)
What Abel Stevens said more than a century ago holds as true today as it did then. Sometimes one just has a very hard time choosing the most civilized among one’s real thoughts. Yesterday was a day of such reckoning for my husband. He had gone grocery shopping to Spencers, a super market in Gurgaon. While he was waiting in the queue at the checkout counter, a Japanese couple cut in front of him. When he protested, the woman proclaimed ignorance “Eigo wakarimasen” (I don’t understand English) while her husband very sagely advised my husband to move to another counter. Even if she did not understand English, I am sure, coming from Japan, the dear lady most certainly understood the etiquette of queues! It takes neither English nor much intelligence to see people waiting in line! I have seen the Japanese behaving equally obnoxiously in Indonesia. Having grown up in a free country, I wondered why Indonesians tolerated it; but the lack of any response from all good people witnessing this behaviour makes me hang my head in shame.
Actually, what is ignominous for us as a nation is our own predilection to kow-tow to all those who are lighter skinned than us, wealthier than us, more influential than us. Another time I was at Spencers (believe it or not) and went to a weighing and pricing counter to get some fruit and vegetables weighed and marked. I was told (as was another lady behind me) that the machine was out of order and we would have to go to the only other one available. There was quite a long queue at this one. However, with no other option available, we both went and stood in line patiently awaiting our turns. Just then an East Asian looking man went to the ‘out of order’ machine and the guy who had but a minute ago told us that the machine was not working, very nonchalantly started weighing this customer’s stuff. I was really shocked and livid, as was the lady behind me. We both challenged the store assistant, but it made no difference. The foreigner got served first, without waiting in any queue! I have lived in several countries, and have sometimes faced subtle, and occasionally not so subtle, racial discrimination. But to face it in my own country really alarms me. Is it only I, or do some others also feel that history is insidiously repeating itself? Are we headed in the same direction as our forefathers with the East India Company?
Atithi devo bhava is lofty and noble, but let us not encourage our atithi to treat us with contempt in our own home and scorn our house rules! And pray, let us have some more respect for ourselves.
