“Hey, where’s my roti! Hey hey! Where’s my roti!”
I was having my breakfast at a kopitiam (a Singaporean neighborhood coffee shop) when I heard the commotion. From what I could piece together, a middle-aged man had left his breakfast on the table to get coffee and returned to an empty table. He shouted at a cleaner for clearing his uneaten breakfast.
But it turned out his roti was at the Indian stall. When he left his table, the cook had helped to keep his roti safe (perhaps from birds, which are quite common here). The man angrily grabbed his roti and sat down to eat—without even apologizing to the cleaner.
I instinctively criticized the man in my head. How could he be so rude without getting his facts right first? When he realized his mistake, shouldn’t he have had the decency to apologize to the cleaner? We don’t need so much anger in this world!
Then, I remembered what Confucius said:
When you see someone who is worthy, concentrate upon becoming their equal; when you see someone who is unworthy, use this as an opportunity to look within yourself.
Instead of criticizing others for their poor behavior, we should use it as a nudge to look inwards and examine ourselves. Maybe I wouldn’t have been that rude, and I would have apologized if I had discovered I was in the wrong. But were there times when I made a wrong assumption and got angry at someone by mistake? Oh, for sure! The man’s unjustified outburst was a reminder for me to act better, not a chance to judge him.
Later, as I thought about the incident, I realized it was also an opportunity to practice empathy. Why might he have reacted that way? He is a neighbor from my estate, so we bump into each other often. From what I gathered, despite having lived in Singapore for many years, he still gets stereotypical comments for being Caucasian. I don’t think what he did was right. But I recognize that if I had been treated unfairly for many years, I would need extraordinary effort to stay calm in such a situation. Will I be able to do it? I’m not sure. But the mirror showed me I need to work on it.
Keep this letter in your book, and it will come back to you.