There were three stout Asians when I opened the door.
“Sir, we are from a charity organization. Any donation is welcome,” they pleaded.
I generally do not entertain such people, but felt I should offer something. “An unexperimented life is not worth it,” Socrates’ words echoed in this journalist’s mind. Let me check out how genuine they are, I told myself. After all, there is nothing worth robbing in my house and Sharjah is known to be a very safe place.
“I give you Dhs10,” I said, ignoring caution signals from my mind.
“Water please,” they entered my home.
“It is for a noble cause. We are helping poor people,” said one.
“Ok. I will give double the promised amount,” I offered.
After sipping water, they said, “Pay Dhs100.”
“One minute,” I replied and went to the nearby room keeping an eye on them. I picked up my mobile, and spoke in my mother tongue loudly and purposely mentioned “three people” in English.
“Sit, sit, what were you saying?” I asked them.
“Thank you, sir,” they barged out in a hurry thinking I had alerted someone.
PS: Never open the gate to a stranger.
“Sir, we are from a charity organization. Any donation is welcome,” they pleaded.
I generally do not entertain such people, but felt I should offer something. “An unexperimented life is not worth it,” Socrates’ words echoed in this journalist’s mind. Let me check out how genuine they are, I told myself. After all, there is nothing worth robbing in my house and Sharjah is known to be a very safe place.
“I give you Dhs10,” I said, ignoring caution signals from my mind.
“Water please,” they entered my home.
“It is for a noble cause. We are helping poor people,” said one.
“Ok. I will give double the promised amount,” I offered.
After sipping water, they said, “Pay Dhs100.”
“One minute,” I replied and went to the nearby room keeping an eye on them. I picked up my mobile, and spoke in my mother tongue loudly and purposely mentioned “three people” in English.
“Sit, sit, what were you saying?” I asked them.
“Thank you, sir,” they barged out in a hurry thinking I had alerted someone.
PS: Never open the gate to a stranger.
7 comments:
Wow! That is presence of mind!
Oh no, now that you are warned and learned your lesson there's nothing in it for me anymore when I come knocking on your door :-)
"Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries."
— Theodore Roethke
Btw, I am an absolute Newbie to blogging - you started before I did. I have no clue what I am doing, really.
You are true.....Never open the gate to a stranger.
I never buy or give when people come to my door I simply tell them to go away. If I want to buy something or give to charity then I will find ways to do so in places that I trust. The same goes for those horrible phone sellers, I simply hang up on them.
Glad to see it worked out ok. Here in the US it is more phone callers. I love to have a little fun with them pretending to be an elderlay man and leading them on, sometimes for ten or fifteen minutes, then as they try to close the deal I insist on a US Mail letter from them. They will visit or Fed-Ex things but avoid the mail as the Postal Inspectors have an almost perfect convistion record and using the mails for fraud is a federal crime. After they get frustrated I go back into accepting the offer, then again insist on a letter with the terms to a PO box. I must have too much time on my hands. I just read a book "The Kindness of Strangers'where a man hitch hiked across the US with NO MONEY accepting food and lodging from strangers. Mostly it was good but a couple of encounters left him wondering about the intentions of the drivers. Good read. Alan
you tricked the tricksters!
Oh Man! So Scary!
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