Taft After Dark

I had a Tolstoy moment... or something like it.

I was walking along the College of Pharmacy Gate along Taft Ave around 9pm on a Thursday night. While waiting for an FX bound for Buendia, somewhere between the CP Gate and where the PGH incinerator had been a couple of years ago, a stranger, a stocky man in his early thirties called me. He looked like he could benefit much from a shower. His shirt, red and fraying, hung loosely to his muscular frame. His jeans were worn and faded, not as a fashion statement but something reminiscent of the power of laundry detergent. Darkness makes one judge too easily, and to me then, he pretty much looked like someone who would mug me and then run away with my money. Fine, call me judgmental.

I was standing in the curb waiting for my ride. He was coming towards me.

"Miss, Miss. Pwede bang makahingi ng limang pi...?".

I looked up and instantly, almost instinctively, I started to flee, even before he could finish what he was going to say. Never mind that I was fleeing to the middle of Taft where the probability of getting hit by an approaching vehicle albeit a slowly moving one (cars never get past 10kph on this side of the world) is close to a hundred. Fear must have taken over my face. As I was putting a foot out of the curb to make my escape, he walked past me, looked at me with a sneer and muttered almost apologetically

"Huwag ka nang tumakbo, kailangan ko lang kasi...".

I looked back at him. In my head I was trying to reason why someone would need 5 pesos, definite at that instant that he was going to hypnotize me then take my money. It's quite amazing how a lot of things could go through your head in a moment. I managed to let out an inappropriate "Hindi po..." but I was already reaching over my pockets for change. It was like my brain and body have completely gone auto-pilot. I was walking away, going for my pockets yet at the same time thinking that this might be a potential hold-up. At that point I was already doing a walk-a-thon in the opposite direction, relieved to have at last found my FX.

Then it hit me.I was overcome with guilt and the realization that I may have judged the man too easily, that whatever he needed five pesos for could be a matter of life and death. That he was desperate and merely asking for help. I was guilty for thinking, plainly put, that he was a hold-upper. He couldn't blame me for walking away. Anyone in that situation would have opted to run. We are socialized to believe and media leads us to think, that people who come up to you at night, in darkness or semi-darkness, is not a good thing. It was the wrong place and the wrong time.

I'm still bothered by the what-ifs though. So, sorry man, whoever you are, I was merely acting on impulse and if it offended you that I thought you'd rob me, I'm terribly sorry for judging. I wish in the end, you found your five peso.

There's something to be learned here, like a moral of the story... or something.