“WHAT? You paid someone else’s toll? Someone you don’t know?” was my loud shriek after I had just heard from my San Francisco friend. This has got to be the most insane thing I’ve ever heard. Have you ever heard of anyone paying someone else’s toll? The next obvious question any average Indian would ask, which I did, was “So how much was the toll?” “It was only $3”, my friend replied. So instead of asking another question or commenting on what she had done I wondered, if I would ever do something like that. Why would I ever want to part with my money for some random person whom I have never met or ever will meet?
I then anticipated a cool story from her. Something from that movie or book, “Pay it Forward”; maybe she happened to meet that guy whose toll she paid and he treated her to dinner, which turned into a date or maybe she was paid back for it by her boss giving her a salary raise. So I asked her, “What happened then?” “Nothing,” was her quick and boring response. “Well, then why would you do such a thing?” “Because it’s cool to watch people’s reaction after you do such a thing.” “What kind of reactions have you gotten then?” “This one time, there was a group of teenagers coming from a party and they raced quickly to my car and screamed out the window, ‘you rock’, ‘you’re awesome’, ‘that was totally cool, man”. And this other time, there was an old couple behind me and they stopped next to me at a red light and gave me their thanks and blessings. It’s fun to see how people respond.” “WOW!” was the only reaction I could think of. It started to slowly make some sense to me, if there was anything sensible about it. One could say that she was feeding her ego or she was showing off. But the people whose toll she paid did not think so. They must have been so happy and excited that they would have done it for someone else later or their day must have taken a higher and happier upswing.
I realized then at that moment that this was such a simple and easy way to make people laugh or happy on a daily basis. How many times in a day do we make a good and nice gesture for people we don’t know? Of course, there’s always that clerk behind the register who we say hi to and wish them a good day. But we do that only when we are on our feet and in contact with them. But today’s world is fast moving; everyone’s in their cars and the personal touch we should be having with people is missing. Paying someone’s toll was a good way to make that nice gesture while being in your car!! Brilliant!
Forget about those poor people in the developing world. Let’s talk about you and me. What can I do to make your day go better and how can you return the favor to me, all this while driving? Here’s an idea for intersectional learning (http://www.themedicieffect.com/ or http://www.themedicieffect.typepad.com/). If you have any other ideas other than paying toll, let’s hear it.
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