The Thank You Note

Have you ever realized, we are not thanking each other enough?

For example, we thank the police traffic for handling our roads manually on peak hours. Have they thanked us back because we paid our taxes? Or thanking the post office for renewing our driving license though we paid for it? Or the LRT cashier who never thanked and wished a good ride, yeah, although we paid for it?

The fact is, we don’t thank enough.

We are not the sopan santun of the east as what we like to call ourselves. To our own people, we discriminate. We slap them around and pretend they don’t exist. Along came the westerners, we worship them like kings, like a rare artifact or fine piece of art. We handle them with great care, as long as they’re blonde or brunette, we call them ‘sir’ when mister would suffice.

Has anyone on our street addresses you as Tuan? Highly unlikely.

Stop it with the wishful thinking of us being courteous, they fact is, we are not. So it’s time to amend our behavior and start thanking people around us. If we keep this up, we could potentially raise a better generation. Insya Allah.