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The kid with the motorcycle

This morning I went to fill my car with petrol. I went in to the petrol station counter to pay for the petrol I was going to pump into my car. Right before it was my turn, there was teenager paying for the petrol to be filled up for his motorcycle.

He looked young, probably only 18 years of age. This kid tells the guy at the counter he wants 5 Ringgit worth petrol for his motorcycle down at pump 5. Then I heard a pause and he then said, "Sorry, make it 3 Ringgit instead.". That's when I noticed him looking into his wallet and I saw it was close to being empty. I think I only saw 2 Ringgit left after he paid for the petrol.

There was no doubt that he had to gingerly reduce the amount of petrol that was going to go into his motorcycle. He was probably thinking of how much mileage he could get from 3 Ringgit worth of petrol. I don't know how far a bike can go on 3 Ringgit because I never owned bike before but one thing I knew with certainty - he definitely wasn't going to go further than 5 Ringgit worth of petrol.

While most of us out there are always dreaming of 'upgrading' to bigger more luxurious fuel guzzling cars, this poor bloke here was lucky to even get some petrol into his bike. As much as we all dream about having nice cars and to be able to boast how much horsepower it packs or its hand made leather seats, we often forget how lucky it is to even have an engine and four wheels that gets us to work and back home safely.

My workplace recently had a bout of salary increment to those who qualified and it triggered quite a fair bit of displeasing sentiment in view of the relatively low increment. There were a lot complains and disagreement with the lower increment this year compared to last year.

As much as it is good to dream about all the luxuries money can bring, one should not forget that one should count one's blessing for a roof over one's head, food to eat, water to drink, a car. While most of us just swipe our credit card at the petrol pump and go "Fill her up!", the kid on the bike had to fracture how little he had in his wallet to make sure he some dough left for other things..........

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