I was on my way to board the Villingili – Male’ ferry to work, this morning, when in front of Khaandhaan Fihaara, a young boy – about twelve years old; walked up to me and asked, “Beybey, rufiyaa eh libidhaane tha?”.
I have this habit of walking with my head down; so I looked up and after pulling myself together from the unexpected request, asked the boy what the money was for. He said he wanted to by “a juice petti”. I thought for a while and told him that I had twenty Rufiyaa in one Rufiyaa note, so that I could give him a rufiyaa when I get change from the ticket counter.
The boy smiled, walked with me for a while and joined two of his friends at a distance, and walked away with them. Though he left, the “weight” of the incident was heavy on my head. It bothered to think of what our society has turned into.
Then again, the art of begging is the culture that we have been conditioned into! Children see it around them every day. We are a people who beg for housing, food, shelter, clothing, medical care, employment, leisure and everything else in our life.
We, the people who specialize in “the art of doing nothing” are the unfortunate beggars, who live in paradise!
Smile and Let Smile 
Mrmaldivian
October 19, 2007 at 2:48 pm
Nice to see a blogger from same place, Vili-Male’.
Mrmaldivian
October 19, 2007 at 2:47 pm
Just three nights back, I think that same boy asked me also for 1 rufiyaa. At first I thought that he might want to buy cigarette so I declined him. Also I thought that he might want to steal money bcoz he had came to me from all the way from ATM to haandaan fihaara. I had just taken Rf3000 from ATM. There was a shorter boy tagging along with him.Its noway to behave like that!
aFu
October 19, 2007 at 3:52 am
Its all abt family planning may b this boi might be frm a family of 5 or 6 whom their parents are getting low wages.Or it might be another trick to earn money by being innocent, what ever it is our society is corrupted, kids are grown in bad nature, The future is with todays people if they arent correcting it, the future would b corrupted… moreover the secondary schooling in Maldives are making the students from bad to worst. So my question is who is really responsible for the stuffs happening in our society :S ?
Abdulla Yasir
October 19, 2007 at 3:45 am
At the heart of doing nothing is the art of begging; you have hit the NAIL!