Dec 12 2010
Taking things for granted – a funny real story
This incident happened to our family some years ago. It all begun with a family visit to Miri, Sarawak. My husband Phillip hired a car to bring us around after we flew in and checked into a hotel. He then called a family friend who was staying in Miri to meet up for dinner with us. He had promised to pick us up at the hotel.
We were all waiting at the lobby of the five star hotel when our friend finally arrived. We shook hands and everyone then proceeded to the hotel entrance where his car was parked. Or so we thought. There was this big car with its doors wide open. How considerate this guy was, I was thinking to myself, to have the car doors opened for us.
Everyone got into the car and was happily sitting in it except our friend. To our puzzlement, he tried to squeeze into the back seat of the car. It was then we realised that we all got into the wrong car and it quickly dawned on us what was really happening. We had assumed that this was our friend’s car. And our friend thought that Phillip had decided to drive as this wasn’t his car. That’s why he decided to squeeze into the back of the car with the children. The adults were embarrassed and quickly rushed the children out from the car.
As we were getting out of the car, we saw a well-dressed man and the hotel door greeter were standing nearby and looking rather shocked and amused at seeing what was going on. I remembered mumbling a word of apology in embarrassment and we quickly followed our friend to his car parked a short distance away from the hotel entrance. While in the car, everyone had a good laugh at what happened.
Until today I cannot forget the look on the man’s face. And each time I think of this incident I would break out laughing to myself. Lesson learnt is never to take people or things for granted.