Day of Kindness

I was having a terrible week. My personal life seemed to be falling apart, and the last thing I wanted to do was get up early to go to school. But this was just what I needed to do. I wormed my way onto a packed-out, muggy bus, sleeping off as I leaned against a sweat-covered guide rail, leaving my claustrophobic-provoking space in a haze and without the zeal to go to school on a Monday. In my dream, I was relaxing on the banks of a canal, not taking classes but just living my life. The unexpected hiss of the bus door being opened woke me up and I did notice that it was my stop; I quickly alighted the vehicle, coughing as exhaust was pouring over me. “Not how a good day should start; anyway, it is not something new” I thought.

My classes usually started at 7 o’clock and since I still had roughly 40 minutes at my disposal, I made a decision to take a walk on the streets so as to get to my right mind and fine-tune myself to a new nettlesome day of the week. My way of life was not so dilapidated as it may appear- I was a relatively decent person with a lot of friends, blessed with talents, and reasonable dreams for my future life. But for reasons unknown to me, this January was seemingly harder for me and many a times I was actually feeling off my rails. As I wandered, I bumped into a couple; a man and woman who were conversing in a foreign language. I could somehow tell that the language they were speaking was French. “Tourists”, I believed, and that they would pass by, however the man did call to me in crooked English. His awful pronunciation was similar to that of a certain Hollywood movie I had watched the previous night on French mafias. “Yes, how can I help you?” I asked him. “We are lost, do you know where Whales Hotel is?” he was evidently audacious as he tried all he could to wade through the jungle marshland of this alien language. “I am sorry, I do not know. I am in a hurry,” I said, and proceeded. I was not in hurry at all, and I was aware of the exact place that the hotel was located but I was so sunk in my problems and bad frame of mind that I was forced to lie. All of a sudden, I felt tainted with guiltiness; after walking approximately sixty feet, I turned back and I was shocked to find the couple still standing there looking bemused. I imagined myself in a city like Las Vegas for the first time, not familiar with the language of the nation, and quivered.

After walking up to them, I told them that I had remembered where the hotel was located and that I was just confused earlier. “Walk straight to the crossroad, take a left turn, and walk approximately 600 feet. You will come across a police station, turn right, and walk straight down the blocks until you come across a green storey building. That is the Whales Hotel.”. The pair was grateful for my help and I walked off frivolously this time around. But upon turning my back, I noticed that they were still there bemused as before.

Suddenly, I came to consider that i could do something more important instead of going to school before time. I knew from that very moment that i could not just leave the couple behind since they were in need of help , besides they spoke poor English that they might have even spent the entire day simply trying to get to their destination. Once again, I walked to where they were and informed them that I still had some free time and that I was willing to guide them to the hotel if they needed my help. The pair looked at one another, smiled and then happily told me that they would appreciate me helping them.

As we headed down the streets, the couple, regardless of their poor English, storied me on their journey and they did not mind sharing their impressions on Las Vegas with me. I realized that they were lively and sociable, and did not hesitate to speak despite their poor English. Before I knew it, I begun understanding them as if they were conversing plainly, and even got to learn quite a number of French words- mainly those that expressed appreciation and pleasure. When we at last got to the hotel, I felt like spending some more time with the pair and showing them the beautiful sceneries in the city, to which they willingly agreed. We exchanged contacts after which I rushed to school. Why was I not feeling sane on the other days of the month? Ever since that day, this question has kept on puzzling me concerning that event and is what I do not understand since for the first time in quite a long period, I felt normal.