An online friend of mine from the Philippines recently told me this story. In his country, it is common to see street vendors with hand-drawn carts selling fried processed fish or squid balls, especially near schools. I don’t know how they stand eating that stuff! Anyway, the food was skewered on small wooden sticks. Times are hard over there, so some vendors would pick up the sticks tossed away by the children and actually re-use them.

The fact disgusted him, but he could see why they did it. Profit was very small for such a vendor, barely feeding him for the day.

This particular day, he saw a vendor picking up the discarded sticks. Making a face, he strode over to the man and tapped his shoulder. He asked the man what he was doing.

The older, poorer man smiled and replied that the local parish priest disliked the trash, and he was cleaning up after the people that did not bother to throw them away in the right place. Needless to say, my friend was stunned…and humbled.

He was taught a valuable lesson that day. Don’t assume the worst of people. There are still decent ones in this world, ones that can teach you valuable life lessons like my friend was taught.

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