A simple piece

This essay deals with the difficulty of choosing a suitable response with strangers to both hostile and friendly behavior and how in the end it is always better to go for a “tit for tat” rather than being persistently vindictive.
Ever since I shifted to Ahmedabad I have had a problem finding a decent place for food. Either you have the small Thepla, Dabeli, Khandwa sellers or the Expensive Restaurants. Luckily for me one day I chanced upon a nice Udipi Hotel very near my hotel. It was a very small place and consisted of a cook, a helper cum waiter and an occasionally present proprietor. It was not too popular. The menu was not exactly wide with hardly 30 dishes on the menu which reduced to about 8 if you discounted the various variants of dosa and uttapam. It became my regular haunt for dinner. Over time they came to recognize me as a regular patron and the waiter who happened to be South Indian exchanged smiles whenever I came or left. I also used to tip him handsomely
The issue I deal with took place when I visited the place after a gap of 2 3 days. It had just been pay day and I chose to eat at rather exotic places in the interregnum. Normally I used to order a curd rice, a sambhar rice and a couple of papads. Today I decided to substitute the curd rice for two sandwiches. One a butter sandwich and the other a cheese Jam sandwich priced at 10 Rs and 30 Rs respectively. As usual the service was swift and I was given a plate with 4 quarters of a slice of bread and butter. The slices seemed unusually thin which made me realize that there was hardly any butter in it. My first reaction was of disappointment and anger. The second was whether I should protest and make a fuss to which a permissive inner voice told me “After all we have been exchanging smiles and been friendly for the past two months, why raise a fuss, after all it is priced at Just Rs 10”. Then spoke the Services MBA in me who remembered the gyaan guest speakers at conclaves had given about how we were moving from “customer delight” to “customer ecstasy”. Of course yet another inner voice told me that all that was gas and I should just lump it. Nevertheless I called the waiter and showing a slice to him asked “where is the butter? He replied “inside the pores”. It was not meant to be an insolent reply but it got on my nerves . I raised my voice and gave him an earful including telling him to price it at 20 if he wanted but not present such a charade before me again. By this time the owner also came over and took the sandwich to be buttered again and smiled at me to placate me. When it was brought back there was far more butter on it, sufficient for a 10 Rs sandwich. I had my meal and was leaving without tipping. I realized they might try and be friendly to me. I decided I would walk out in a huff without returning their smiles. And indeed they did smile at me both the proprietor and the waiter. They were genuine and simple hearted smiles especially the waiters. Now naturally I am a polite person and instinctively wanted to smile back. But I walked on. I was thinking to myself what must their motivation to smile at me be? Surely business interest? Or the familiarity we shared? Or Both? BY this point I was quite a few steps ahead a voice inside me was telling me “Hriday be man enough you can still go back and wave goodbye to them as always”. I ignored it and walked on, the voice retorted “Don’t be a stuffy adult. It wont make you a lesser man to go back and wave to them” So indeed I walked back. I waved at them, they waved back. And I felt good! Warm inside!
The sceptic inside me still doubts if it was the please all Hriday who waved goodbye or if it was my response to make peace not having a more convenient place for dinner. I don’t know who is right. The child who waved goodbye to the passing trains or the sceptic who is a born again cynic. In fact I don’t even know if I will go back to that restaurant again. But I do know that I felt good when I waved and they waved back! And perhaps that if I had not waved back my mood would have been sore now unlike the pleasantness I feel now!