I don't know how true what I am about to say is, but I guess that in everyone's life, there is this one person, probably not just one person, it could be a family or just someone close to a person that we tag as a stingy or greedy.
This person will be someone that is definitely irreplaceable, so no matter how much you cry or complain about this person or set of people, the bond that you share will just have to bring you guys back, but then, the consciousness of that fact that the person you are dealing with is tagged according to you “a stingy or greedy person"...
(So you tell me, how true was what you just read? I have someone in my life that is like that, so of course, I am not exempted. You tell me if you have someone or some people like that in your life or family that are known to be either stingy or greedy in the comment section, I'd be waiting to hear from you...)
Yeah, so like I said, a lot of people have people who are known to be either stingy or greedy or maybe even both, and like I said, I am or exempted. I will give you a short story that describes what I am talking about...
If there is one thing I realize in we Nigerians, it is that we give too much credit to those that are outside the country, how do I mean? We already have this mindset that when a person goes or travels for another country, the person is now automatically rich or at least is capable of dealing with some high amount of money, I'm not saying they can't, don't get me wrong, but then, we then place some kind of expectations on them, and so when they don't meet up to those expectations, we be like *“i thought he was in the UNITED STATES or UNITED KINGDOM or other countries, so why can't he help me with this and this kind of things, and then this leads to start comparing other people who are not family that traveled abroad and became successful to their families that are doing as if they are not successful, which leads us to call them stingy.
This also happens to those in the village, as soon as one of their family member travels to Lagos, they be like, they must have made it, but when the person is not doing up to that standard, you say the person is now proud or stingy or greedy or probably all of that above, which gives the person a bad name and so on...
There was a time in my life when I needed a phone really bad, in fact, it wasn't just me, my mom and dad as well, but then, there was one of my aunty in the United States, my mom's younger sister, she was to come to Nigeria for their father's burial, and so my mom asked her to get her a phone, and she agreed, and the day my aunt arrived in Nigeria, and was to give my mom the phone she requested for from her sister, (my aunty was using an iPhone 8 plus as of then) she gave my mom an android phone, not just an android phone, a Samsung product, (oh, it's sounding nice right? I thought so too until I heard the kind of Samsung) not just any Samsung, but a J series, not just any J series, just the Samsung galaxy J1 mini, a duarf phone that was as small as my mom's palm.
I was highly disappointed when I heard about this, why did she have to do this, to me, it would have been better if she didn't bring anything that she bringing that along from the United States, come on, I expected more, buy no, my expectations were cut short, I was confused wether to call it stinginess or greediness or both, we just had to let that slide...
Some years after that, I summoned courage again to tell her that I needed a phone, and then I was using one eyes to check if she will reply, and when I saw that she had read the message, my heart will skip, and then when I see that she is typing, I did not know if I was to be happy or I am to be patient, anyways, she replied, and that was the day I was served a typical breakfast.
Oh now I remember, I wasn't typing, it was a voice call, she replied to me and said, and I quote.
Chris dear, you need a phone, that's good, but I do not produce phone
When I heard this, my heart first sank, and then bounced back, so I replied and told her that I know that you don't produce phone, I mean I want you to get me a phone.
Am so she replied and said an do I quote
if indeed you really need a phone, then you should go and work
I almost fainted when I heard these words, I was like, what's the meaning of these statements that she just made? Who does that? I was really heart broken that I almost promised myself never to ask of anything in my life again, and then I'd go and work and get what I want, I mean everything in life that I need, and even be richer than her, and show her that she really hurt me back then but I've worked harder and got things for myself...
Cause I was like, couldn't you just send me a 50k so I can get a phone, or when you are sending things to Nigeria, you could just use that opportunity to send me a phone, but no, she said I should go and work...
Just few months after then, someone in Nigeria that didn't know me got me a brand new phone with carton from a slot, can you imagine? I put too much faith in the people living abroad while there are rich people in my country...
I later got to see that my aunt's first born which should be just one year older than our last born, he was using an iPhone 11, I was just like, wow cool...
Was she being stingy? Or now should I call it selfishness? Or greediness or is that training? Or all of the above?
I'd love to hear from you in the comment section.
Thank you all very much for taking your time to read through to this point, I appreciate...
PS: this post is dedicated to the Hivelearners Weekly Featured Contents, Week 50 episode 03