Thinking Beyond Survival

I hate people who try to guilt trip somebody just so they could be paying for more, even more so, when it isn’t entirely your own fault. Here’s how it went at the time.

It was an amazing day, clear blue sky and all that jazz. I was excited to check out this place in town that I’ve never tried before. It’s a big deal knowing that I might get shit or good coffee which if it’s shit coffee, could ruin the whole day no matter how beautiful that is.

So, on my way to the place, I took Grab bike, that online ride. The person who was driving the bike kept complaining because the Grab takes a huge cut of his earnings and because I was doing 2 spots, the ATM and the cafe, he was complaining that the price was ludicrous.

During the ride, I was saying things like “ well, I mean customers aren’t at fault at this. Why don’t you mention this concern of pricing to Grab?”

“ Well, we did. I have asked my driver's friend to protest. To strike and stopped working for 3 days. Our family would still be eating and their family won’t die if we just stop for 3 days. I am sure that taught a lesson to Grab” He said with annoyance.

In my head I was like, “ well. that’s your family that’s not the case with others and I am going to prove my point”

He kept blabbering about how the application takes a huge cut and their pricing isn’t reasonable. I was being nice at the time and added more tip to cover the cost. But when I got down to my final destination, he asked me “ how much did you put in the tip?”

“ 2000” I said which honestly I shouldn’t even be paying in the first place.
“ That's really not enough. 5000 it is” he said to me.

I didn’t want to argue further and just handed him the bills. I paid but I was furious and I even wanted to report the person because I was paying the amount I wasn’t supposed to. Then I stopped and reflected instead of rushing to cause the problem because I know a very good fact that I only revealed now.

He is our neighbor in our other home.

Our other home is where the comfortable retiree and new money lives. It’s gated residential with one gate system, security and all that jazz. I was living with my paternal family and took care of their bills. It cost more than anything I’ve seen. Living there isn’t necessarily cheap.

“ what if you’re poor living in this area” I asked my mom once
“ Well, you can’t be poor living here. If you can’t afford it, the homeowner association would certainly want you to choose somewhere else within your range”. That’s what my mom answered.

That answer also was my decision to really took up the decision to just move in my current house where running is cheaper and the fact that it’s mine, not really anybody else’s name in the deeds.

Anyway, that driver even lived in one of the alleyways with the most modern side of the entire neighborhood while ours is simply among the retiree areas where they used to work at the same government factory and everybody knows everybody. So, hearing how conveniently he said that he wanted every driver in town to strike is a lot for some of them. I mean the other drivers won't definitely have the privilege as he is.

Sure, his own family could still be alive, eat and well. I mean, you can’t live in that neighborhood without a certain net worth. Even if you’re renting one of the properties there, you'd still have to have certain amount saved up. So, you get the gist that he's speaking in a position of privilege.

That incident got me reflect on a lot of things particularly the idea of “ thinking beyond survival”

Later that day, I used the same service and asked the driver the same question(thankfully not the same person). “ What if one of your peers asked you to strike and stop working for 3 days. Would you do it?”

“ Well, I wouldn’t. I mean, finding a job is difficult these days & I got several mouth to feed” he told me.

I used to hear about these things like “ oh look, they’re complaining about using macbook,iphone etc”. That probably is similar to this that these people that complain was able to think beyond survival.

Would you care about how the government run if you don’t even know what to eat for today? would you even care what the congressmen, senators even said, corrupted or such if you don’t have a roof over your head tonight? bet you don’t. Would you even have the time to stop and look around that the system is at fault? Would you even think about all that when it’s either do or die? It’s such a privilege to be able to think beyond survival, to criticize a system and to complain.

I’d hear phrases like, “ We’re only commoners oppressed by the system” but the thing is... have you ever really worked or utilized the things that you have to change the said system that oppressed you?

For that driver, honestly he has the option. The options to quit, to choose another platform because Grab isn’t the only one in the market. There are numerous and people use whatever is out there and there’s going to be customers left and right. So, why won’t he leave? Certainly it seems Grab as an app was still the best option for that person.

Whatever the system is, even Hive can work like that too if you think about it.

The question has always been about, can we do something about it? Can we change whatever is needed to change? Maybe if we can’t, just complain quietly? beats me haha but I’d love to take the approach of just keeping my head down, work until I can certainly change whatever I don’t like and make contributions when necessary. Lead by example sort of thing. That’s this Sunday’s reflection.

See you around.