What’s your take on this?

I have met people who like to portray themselves as very classy, wearing and talking brands, moving in high end circles, using English as a pretence of their status and carrying an air of superiority in front of others.

Well, most of the time, I’m least concerned with their behavior, but the following incidents prompted me to think if their behavior was really aligning with what they were trying to show themselves as?

Is their thinking actually classy? Read on and let me know what you think!

1. A day after Diwali

This family of three was bursting crackers with their little child. Apart from ignoring the issue of the worsening air quality, they were demonstrating something to their child I would not call as an example of ‘good parenting’.

As the little one was about to light a cracker, they purposefully stopped him and walked over to the middle of the road, away from their own house and then started lighting the crackers. Soon, they were lighting their ‘anar’ and ‘chakris’ on the neighbors ramp and when they left, the area had been charred at places and dirtied with litter of the burst crackers.

What was the family trying to fit in their little one’s mind? Were they trying to tell that all the dirty jobs have to be done outside other’s homes while keeping their own place clean?

What has happened to the little voice inside their head which makes one feel ashamed of doing something like this?

I cannot fathom what is the use of running after expensive private schooling if one does not care about basic Etiquettes.

What’s more interesting is their strong or even highly tempered reaction when someone does something similar to them!

2. Benevolence done the wrong way
I feel this one’s a kind lady when I see her petting one of the street dogs and feeding it regularly. However, how she does it attracts my displeasure and the neighborhood’s anger.

Like an over smart neighborhood lady, she waits till 11 pm or later for most of the neighborhood to sleep, then she fills the dog’s bowl with food, crosses over the road, to reach the opposite house.

This ritual continues each day, as she would keep the bowl on other’s ramp, call out the dog, pet it, and wait for it to finish so she can take the plastic bowl back. (The same bowl has to be refilled tomorrow, she can’t spare more bowls!)

Ocassionally, one would see leftover food packs dumped outside this neighbor’s gate, for the dogs. Usually these are leftover restaurant meals.If the dogs too reject this meal, the sight outside their home is of pure mess the next morning. The neighbors don’t regard highly this ultra classy social butterfly.

3. The cleanliness freak

This one’s has an authoritative aura, and wears pride right up on her sleeve. Being a cleanliness freak, we can usually hear her instructing and supervising her maid when she is doing the cleaning job.

One fine morning, she made her maid collect every speck of garbage from outside her home, pile it up and burn it. But as her maid brought the lighter, she asked her to stop and transport the heap to the neighbor’s cemented flooring on the opposite side. Then she stood by, supervising the burning job, making sure nothing is left unburnt.

If burning the garbage is wrong, leaving the charring for the neighbors is more wrong. What’s the use of moving in high profile circles and acting all classy when your thinking is so marred?

By the way, this one got caught in action by the residents of the particular house! *Ouch!*

4. The snoop

Apart from being an envy of the neighborhood ladies due to her habit of posing in a new dress every other day, this one has a habit of snooping into people’s home.

It’s early morning, and this lady dressed in gym wear for her morning walk, leaves her home as usual. Then she waits and glances right and left, up and beyond to check no one is looking. Satisfied, She marches to the opposite house and opens their gate, leaving the handle very lightly to avoid any attention. She walks to her target- the Tulsi(holy basil) plant and starts plucking the leaves. Day by day, the plant is going barren as the winters don’t conduce new growth. In these months of extreme winters, the plant only struggles to survive, as its leaves turn into a dark bluish green with the effects of fog. The lady is still undettered, continuing her ritual and purposefully leaving the the entrance gate’s latch open on her way back. The noise of closing that gate is enough to make the residents of the house alert!

Soon, only a few leaves are left when she sends her daughter with basket to collect leaves for storage. Like her mother, this girl too plucks them ruthlessly, not caring to leave the small new growths or buds and pluck the other leaves instead. That day, the plant is left barren and the lady now targets a house at the end of the lane, who have planted this plant in their garden. Did I mention the effort she had to make to find a new plant after the former’s barrenness? One would find her peeking in all directions to sniff out another Tulsi plant.

I think using something is fine, but over utilising the resource and leaving it to die barren is not a something a classy person would do!

What do you say?

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