Last week at a New York department store. I took the elevator to the fifth floor. The car was packed. Among some twenty people in the car was a sturdy man in his fifties holding a big dog on a leash. Grumpily he demanded a young Asian woman to step back to allow his dog to sit. The Asian woman said, she couldn't possibly step further back because of the people standing behind her. This answer made the man hiss at her: "Why don't you go back to China!" Immediately all the other people in the car responded. "How dare you!" – "Racist!" – "Get out of here!" – "You ought to be ashamed!". The man with the dog had no choice but to leave the elevator at the next stop. And I thought, this is why I love New Yorkers. They take a stand. Sunday, November 21, 2010
Only In New York
Last week at a New York department store. I took the elevator to the fifth floor. The car was packed. Among some twenty people in the car was a sturdy man in his fifties holding a big dog on a leash. Grumpily he demanded a young Asian woman to step back to allow his dog to sit. The Asian woman said, she couldn't possibly step further back because of the people standing behind her. This answer made the man hiss at her: "Why don't you go back to China!" Immediately all the other people in the car responded. "How dare you!" – "Racist!" – "Get out of here!" – "You ought to be ashamed!". The man with the dog had no choice but to leave the elevator at the next stop. And I thought, this is why I love New Yorkers. They take a stand. 
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ReplyDeleteAt first sight a beautiful, incouraging metaphor of life and example of civic behaviour and conscience. But there is a dark side. It frightens me, when one single person (even if sided by a big dog), surrounded by a crowd of 20 persons - in a country where antiracism (but not opposition to cultural xenophobia) is a firm part of the protestant fundamentalism's credo - dares to attack (with a futile motivation) a young lady who belongs to another culture.
ReplyDeleteThis is an ambiguous omen.
Sex vultures prior vidit Remus,cum duplex avium numerus Romulo se ostendit