"The darkness of the whole world cannot swallow the glowing of a candle. ~Robert Altinger"
Chanukah, the Jewish festival of lights, is an 8 day festival commencing on the 25th of the Jewish month of Kislev. We light the traditional menorah, also known as the Chanukiah. Tonight is the 2nd night of Chanukah, where we have lit the second branch on the menorah.
This brings me to the theme of today's posting. Light. Think of light. Think of light in whatever representation it comes to you in, be it in stars, fire, positive energy, mitzvot (commandments), the sun, anything. In today's times, while we have no shortage of physical light, many people live in spiritual darkness, and have unfortuntaely lost their ways. This saddens me tremendously.
Two incidents the other day that I was witness to, illustrate the lack of Derech Eretz, loosely translated as common courtesy, that people show towards one another. I was in a store in an upmarket outdoor mall, waiting for the shop assistant to help me with something. While I was frustrated at the lack of service that I was receiving, I tried to distinguish between the woman and the issue. She is human and has feelings. I need to treat her with 'Derech Eretz'. During my wait I was able to witness two different encounters between 2 separate customers and various shop assistants. You see, I was in a cellphone store, so this makes it a VERY personal issue, knowing how many people are highly addicted to their cellphones these days. so the first incident, was that a young lady came in, looking all annoyed that she had to be there. She had either lost or had her cellphone stolen. The contract for the cellphone was signed in her brother's name. She had called ahead to make sure that she did not need him to be present, and to find out what else she needed to start the process for a new cellphone to be issued. Basically, the crux is that when she arrived at the store, she discovered she had been misinformed about the necessary documents she needed to have with her, and importantly she needed to have her brother present to sign the new documents. Now, yes, it is indeed frustrating to be misinformed, and to receive poor service, but her reaction is what made things worse. She screamed and shouted at every shop assistant she could see. She pointed fingers and made eveyone feel badly. She made it so clear that she was 'better than all of them', and patronised them until the end. I could see that the first shop assistant that dealt with her initially was also fairly inexperienced. Her behaviour was atrocious, in simple terms.
The point is that sometimes we will get bad service, sometimes we will get misinformed, and yes sometimes our time (yes, our precious time) will be wasted. But remember, its how you react that is the true test. The person, the service provider, who gets the brunt of your anger, will feel inferior and looked down on, and you might feel arrogant for a while. But you don't achieve anything like this. Arrogance deflates. Being embarrassed sticks with you. But keeping your cool and treating the person across from you like a human, has everlasting effects for everyone involved. Catch you breath. And most importantly, remember to say thank you.
The second incident shocked me even more, being that I myself am a mother to a 16 month old, and I realise how impressionable kids are. Children learn from their prime example- their parents. There were two young girls there, probably in their late teens, trying to get something sorted out with their cellphones. Now I don't know what happened before to bring in such a response, but the next minute, their mother stormed into the store, and hissed words at them that I dare repeat. It was something along the lines of "YOU F****** LITTLE B*****'S, you can find your own ways home. To clarify, this was the MOTHER talking to her CHILDREN as such, in PUBLIC. Need I say more.
The point is that sadly, people have lost their way. If people cannot learn from their parents how to talk to other people, if people's own parents can talk to them us such, what hope do they have of treating others, outside their immediate circle, with any form of respect.
Please, if you are reading this, continue to shine your light and good values to this dark world in which we live. If you have manners, please teach them to your children. Treat you children like you would want them to treat the rest of the world. Have Derech Eretz, and please be a mensch.
Chanukah Sameach!
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