RE: Blog, 20 May 2019: "Special" Delivery? No ... Good Samaritan story?
What an interesting day turned out of a simple misunderstanding :)
While I was reading the post I was wondering what would I have done? Perhaps I would never deliver the package myself but rather call FedEx and leave it at their center. And that would prevent me from this human encounter you went through. Sometimes just meeting someone at your doorstep could make you feel so much better, or less lonely, or more hopeful... It's close to @thedarkhorse story with the old lady at the grocery shop.
I was also wondering about the feedback you are planning to give to FedEx. Is it just you that you feel somehow responsible about helping them to eliminate this kind of mistakes or it's your country's culture? What would other Americans do? Would they write Fedex back?
In my country, no one would ever bother. One huge problem of our society is that we don't feel like our voice matter and our actions could make a change. This is a thing that I hate so much about this country. It has a lot to do with communism and the post-communism (jungle-wild-like) transition. Perhaps many people ( I don't know if it would be the majority of people (hope not)) would even keep the package to themselves. Just because they wouldn't think that it's their responsibility to give it back.
So, is it just you and your wife, or it's your society mindset? :) What do you think? :)
Good morning 🌄 (here) @insight-out. Interesting to start my day (while you are presumably much closer to the end of yours …) with reading your response. You ask great questions. Which do not (at least for me) have simple, easy answers. I will do my best … 😊
Exactly! As I have written elsewhere here, had the customer “service” call by my beloved to FedEx been handled better, this story would never have been written. Even then, I told her not to worry and that I would take care of it. The “easy button” solution, as well as my natural inclination and first impulse, was to take it to the nearby specialty package office and be done with it, so I could get on with my plans for the day. Letting them deal with the error, since I knew they have daily interaction with FedEx ...
Up to the last minute or so of leaving our home, this was my direction and again this story would never have been written. The “nice grandma lady” image she left with me, before my wife drove away, made the difference, in spite of my competing thought “there won’t be anyone home” and more time wasted all due to someone’s carelessness. Discussing it with her once she returned home, my wife reinforced a key “bottom line” of the experience, by referring to our mothers …
Good question. I can’t speak for others. My focus, given my background, was the former – potentially help them avoid putting someone else in a similar bind. I say ”potentially” due to the possibility, even though I have invested my time in the attempt, that whoever is responsible on the receiving end to do so, just will not take the time to follow-up. Happens regularly, but I will be at peace knowing I did my part. Based not on any thought of my somehow being responsible for their failure, but simply doing the right thing …
These questions are at the heart of the story. And my continued fascination with our Steem blockchain providing an opportunity to interact with others all over the world … I’ll take the last one first. It is more a matter of what my wife and I believe, than what we think. Hence, my closing reference to ”… different systems of belief …”, as that will be the biggest factor for most in how they chose to view an experience like this one (see responses and experiences of @blessed-girl and @cicisaja, for examples …).
Yes, in the past, @thedarkhorse has made references to kharma, in expressing his pay-it-forward philosophy to others ... While I do not share belief in the eastern religion origins of this word, I can more or less agree with its common “cause and effect” application. As it more or less states what many hold to be universally true …
As far as comparing America to Bulgaria and how our respective country’s cultures would lead one to typically respond, I will say it was once consistently taught here that we have a Christian heritage. That ceased to be the case some time ago. With attendant “cause and effect” behavior patterns … uhhh … “evolving” from it … If you wish to invest the time, I’d love to read your own thoughts / beliefs / feelings on what the first sentence means to you. From your country’s history and perception of the effect of Russia’s imposition (my words and understanding …) of communism and the subsequent ”post-communism (jungle-wild-like) transition” away from it.
Hope all is well with you and yours today. Until “next time,” all the best to you @insight-out!
Thanks for your replay, @roleerob! It was such a pleasure reading it :) This is an extremely broad subject (and it's one of my favorite subjects :)). Christian moral is a very interesting angle to look at it. Communism fell short after I was born. So I have never lived in those times. All I know is stories from the previous generation. And everyone of course has their own perception of it. Some miss it and long it. Others despise it. I guess it was just like Orew's Animal Farm. Some believed in the idea while others exploited it/them.
Back to the question. Communists denied religion. The party kind of forbad going to church. It was something that would probably set you back if you were "caught". It was something like 40 years of religion-free society. The church as an institution never fully recovered. Usually, around the world, the churches are the core of the communities, but here it's just a passive institution with mafia connections. Although now many people go to church on Easter and Christmas and baptize their children, it's more like following an old tradition rather than acting like Christians. We act more like an atheist society.
But I don't think that it's only the death of God that caused this passiveness. It's the core belief that your voice doesn't matter. For 40 years you couldn't speak your mind. You couldn't tell jokes about the party. You couldn't vote for real. You as a human being didn't matter. What mattered was the party and the utopic idea which never came to reality.
Then the transition came. The first years were only a matter of survival. Similar to what's happening to Venezuela these days. Your voice didn't matter again. What mattered was the voice of the mafia.
However, that was not all. There were 500 years before that in which Bulgarians were part of the Ottoman empire and basically were in the same situation. What's interesting is that Christianity, in this case, saved our identity during these 5 centuries.
So Bulgarians are quite used to being passive and told what to do. OMG, just as I write to you right now I realize that such heritage cannot be change over a decade. This is very frustrating! And the sad thing is that the world as a whole goes into a direction in which the voice of the common people is less and less heard (at least in my opinion).
In psychological terms, it's called external locus of control. In short, it's when you believe that everything that happens to you is due to external, but not internal factors. It's the opposite of taking responsibility.
Another psychological construct is the so-called power distance. There is very interesting research studying the power distance amongst different countries. The index for America is 40. The index for Bulgaria is almost doubled - 70. You can look at the rest of the constructs that characterize our countries and see the differences.
So, I know all this in theory, but for me, it is very interesting to look through the eyes of someone who is part of a totally different society :)
Have a wonderful day you, too, @roleerob!