Years later, patience paid

Lal Singh

Our ship was on a Far East-Pacific-US voyage. After loading cargo at Calcutta and fuel bunkering in Singapore, we reached a Taiwanese port called Keelung. While on a sightseeing walk, I found a huge crowd outside a large department store. The banners and loud announcements were in the local language, but it was obvious that a special sale was going on. I went into the store and picked up some small items. I stood in a long queue leading to the payment counter. Unable to comprehend the PA announcements, I did not bother to find out more about it. While I was nearing the counter, a person ahead of me left his well-loaded shopping trolley to pick up another item from a nearby shelf. I don’t know what came over me to jump the queue and take his place. As I paid the bill and started moving towards the exit, I heard clapping at the payment counter. The person whose place I had taken was being greeted with handshakes. He had won a lucky draw, being the nth or randomly picked up person, which won him a gift hamper and a discount on his purchases. Had I not foolishly jumped the queue, I would have won the draw! It did not cheer me much when the lucky gentleman gave me a thank-you look. 

The folly haunted me whenever I went shopping, but it did teach me a lesson: keep patience, it may pay. Many years later, just near the fag-end of my service, I got sort of rewarded for this feeling — on the other side of the globe, at the Long Beach port near Los Angeles. We had a long stay at the port, and I would visit downtown stores. Once, I went to a supermarket and picked up a large jar of Tang. There was a long queue in front of the payment counter, which I also joined. When my turn came, a buxom lady with a trolley full of her purchases, pushed me aside without even an apology. She probably noticed my single item as her justification to take my place in the queue. But this uncharitable act was not missed by the young salesgirl at the counter, who cast a disdainful look at the haughty customer. After a long list of her purchases were accounted, registered and paid for, the lady departed. 

I handed over my single item to the salesgirl, who wrapped and put the jar in a small carry bag. She handed it over to me without any payment. When I opened my wallet to pay, she just smiled and declined any payment, saying, ‘Sir, I have already charged that lady for your item in her bill as a penalty and lesson for her boorish behaviour and a small reward for your patience.’ 

This gesture was a good compensation for my self-deprecating old guilt of jumping the queue many years back at the Keelung store.