The Taho Vendor And The Bad Samaritan

 

I want to live, I want to give
I've been a miner for a heart of gold
It's these expressions I never give
That keep me searching for a heart of gold
And I'm getting old…

 

     So you approached a vendor selling taho…

     YOU: “Manong, how much is the taho?”

     MANONG: “Ten pesos. The bigger cup, twenty.”

     YOU: “I only have three pesos… but I’m really hungry… can I buy your taho for three pesos?”

    MANONG: “No problem, I will just give you this taho in the bigger cup for free so you can eat."

     YOU: “Oh, Manong, you’re so kind.”

     Manong handed you a cup of taho which you slowly ate, as you really didn’t like taho and weren’t sure if it was hygienic.

     Then, you put out your expensive camera and started videoing him, intending to scatter it all over social media, not even asking him if he valued his privacy or not, or if he wanted to see his face plastered all over socmed, you were thinking that the man was poor, uneducated and needed money, so he really wasn’t aware or didn’t care about the concept of privacy, and then you told him: “Manong, this is just a social experiment. You see, I’m a vlogger and I’m trying to find out if you’d be so kind to still give me taho even though I didn’t have enough money. Here, take these one thousand pesos, it’s yours because you’re so kind.”

     Then you left after asking the taho vendor to subscribe to your channel, you uploaded the video on YouTube and other social media platforms where people feasted and commiserated with his being poor, with the “charitable” video automatically giving many people the right to poke and pry about the taho vendor’s life and commenting, comparing you to the biblical Good Samaritan. The video got millions of views and gave you substantial amount of money, which enabled you to buy another high-end gadget; and the taho vendor never crossed your mind again, and now you’re busy eyeing this ‘miserable’ fishball vendor and thinking if he's a poor man with a golden heart who is deserving of help. You touch your pants’ front pocket and smile when you feel the one-thousand peso bill there.

     So are you a Good Samaritan? One who has a bleeding heart for the poor and the downtrodden?

     No! You’re a scumbag and a con artist!

     Here’s a sample of a genuine Good Samaritan… last year, I met an accident while biking, my bicycle’s front wheel got stuck in a manhole’s cover, with the vehicles behind me barely avoiding me. A motorcycle rider stopped and helped me get the tire unstuck (I could never pry it off the manhole alone), he only left when I assured him that I was okay.

     No, he didn’t video the incident, probably didn’t even tell other people about it, just happy to help.