Arrogance is the Full Sister of Ignorance

What a long weekend! My in-laws were here for a short holiday and we were happy to accommodate their needs. We went to Bandung and Bogor during the weekend and had an enjoyable time, especially the Safari in Bogor and the factory outlets in Bandung. (I’ll write about it in a later post.)

Anyway, we had encountered an incident on Monday morning. While waiting for my hubby to get into the mpv, my only one-week-old down stairs neighbour had arrogantly scolded our driver just because he was in ‘her’ parking lot. (Since we are living on the top floor of a townhouse, she is our only down stairs neighbour.) To make things more embarrassing, my in-laws were already inside the mpv.

We were shocked with the slim and pretty Chinese lady’s stern and arrogant ‘morning greet’. My hubby just apologized and we moved to start the day’s itinerary, refusing to let the unpleasant occurrence to spoil our spirit of the day.

Once we got home later that afternoon, my hubby called the management to seek their assistance to verify our actual parking lot. We were confused as we had no problems with regards to such matters before. So far, expatriate residents in this community, regardless of their nationalities, live in harmony and tolerance.

To our surprise, we were informed that our usual spot is actually our parking lot as per the master plan of the estate, although the new resident had instructed maintenance office to change our unit’s D-1-5 signage to her D-0-5! Her actual parking lot is about 500 meters further around the block. (Haa..haa..!)

The management apologized for the inconvenience caused and added that the fussy Singaporean lady (who is married to an American), had lodged a handful of miscellaneous complaints since she had moved in. We also learned that we were not the only ‘victim’ of her kiasu attitude. Other neighbours and even the management had the same experience.

Moral of the story is always to behave ourselves once we are abroad and to be considerate to others in all situations. It affects our country’s name as others look at us as our nationality first, then, who we are as a person. No matter how great we feel, there is no harm being polite and humble. At the end of the day, with God’s will, things may turn out the other way around! In our case, we had the last laugh. :)