It's What We Say And Do

This afternoon, I went to donate stuff for the flood relief efforts - and became a beneficiary of the kindness of others when my car battery died at the underground parking lot at IGB Tower, TTDI.

Two foreign security guards tried to push my car in an attempt to jump-start it. It failed; I was told later this evening that such emergency jump-starts only worked with manual vehicles. Eventually, one of them looked under the hood and concluded that the battery was gone. He pushed my car into another parking space while I looked for help.

Luckily there was a car workshop nearby. The chief foreman and possibly the boss drove me back to my car with a new battery. I also learnt a bit about my car: seems you can change the battery while the engine's running (it's not battery-operated), and one should, to keep certain settings in the car's electronics from being re-set, like my clock and saved radio channels.

"No good deed goes unpunished", some might say. But I should note that the battery's about two years old, at a time when many other batteries warrant replacement.

In the face of misfortune or a force of nature, what or who we are is nothing. What stands out most is we say and do. And what the volunteers were doing at the donation drop-off point at TTDI is great.

Some of those who formed human chains to convey donated goods into vehicles for transport included migrant workers at the restaurants/drop-off points, like the guards who helped me out.

Let's be like this all the time, rather than during emergencies only.