A few days back, something
happened with me that made my faith even stronger on my thinking about social
media. “Don’t follow it blindly.”
Last
week on Thursday morning, I woke up and started checking my piled up WhatsApp
messages. One message because of its strange assertion made me sore instantly.
“Forward it to 5 more groups immediately and get good luck in return. If you
ignore, this will cost you so much.” I really abhor such messages. And
similar ones on Facebook where they claim a bad luck if people don’t hit like
on them.
Then
my morning chaos started and I got lost in getting ready for office along with
my son. After reaching office and dropping my son at his daycare, I jumped upon
my breakfast. While having it, I was watching the news on TVs which are placed
in my office cafeteria. And no wonder there was a single topic flooding on
every of the new channel, Currency ban. I want to write a separate blog on how
I see this Demonetization. But for the current story, I am sticking to what I
thought while watching the news that day. I was actually thinking to withdraw
some cash from my office ATM as a day before people were displaying their
2000-rupee note like a trophy after coming out of ATM. I asked few things to
ATM guard and finally I was in the queue at 10.30 morning. As per guard,
everyday cash comes around 11.30 so 10.30 was the best time to secure a place
(a chair) in the queue.
It
was 12 PM and I was still standing (actually sitting because cafeteria has a
good volume of chairs so everyone was comfortably sitting and waiting) in the
queue. Not finding me in my seat, my manager called me for daily update
meeting. I replied that I was waiting for cash van. Hearing this, he got a bit
agitated and in response, I also got miffed. Rudely I told him that I would
come only after withdrawing cash. I never want to mess up with my manager but
it happened. And then everyone , waiting in the queue, was informed about NO
CASH that day. We were informed that respective bank didn’t give money and
that’s why cash would not be coming. Suddenly I recalled that WhatsApp message
that ignored and thought “It is big for not forwarding a message.”
I
was back to my seat and saw my teammates were grinning. I was not LUCKY to get
cash despite I stood there for 2 hours and had an argument with my boss. I
resumed my work and some problems started coming in building the code (I am in
software profession). Again that silly message knocked my head. “Is it a bad
luck incarnated over?” I asked to myself. Somehow the day passed and I was
thinking about the nomination which I was about to give for taking part in an
interoffice singing challenge. “Should I do it tomorrow as today is an unlucky
day for me?” “Oh.. I have to ask Vandana Ji first. What if she denies?”
With all these thoughts I reached home. Vandana Ji is an artist from my
neighborhood who takes singing classes. With so much of mind turbulence
and fear of BAD LUCK, I went to Vandana Ji. And she happily agreed. “ Ahh.
Everything is fine and my luck is also fine..” I muttered.
When
I was getting the dinner ready, my husband came to me and showed me a few new
notes of 2000 rupees. One of my neighbors are boys who are working and still
bachelors. They had exchanged the old currency for us. My husband had a wide
smile on face and he said “How LUCKY we are!! We got our money exchanged
without standing in a queue.” For sure bad luck was not chasing me and it never
can because of any wacky WhatsApp message. It was my tender mind which
connected these dots.
These
messages which want people clicking “Like” or forwarding them further only
plays with emotions of people. And the superstitious minds of common people
many times believe on them. However, I am back on my belief of ignoring such
messages. I know deleting them will not make me any less of God believer and
will never hurt my friends who send me such insane stuff.
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