Hmm… it happened again; while I was going for dinner I met this young lad. As a true andhraite he first spoke in Telugu. Some of andhraites have such a strong accent that even if they are speaking Hindi or English, it feels like they are speaking Telugu. So, after carefully hearing him twice or thrice, I determined that he is speaking Telugu and asked him to speak Hindi. So, this guy told me that he has lost his purse and needs some money to go to his place. At first he asked 80 rupees and then said needs at least 40 rupees (as I was unaware of the place he mentioned he has to go, I couldn’t figure out myself home much he might need) adding that if I give address, he will come tomorrow morning and give the money back to me. He looked genuine but then my recent previous such incident came to my mind and I told him that I don’t have money; maximum I can help him is 10 rupees, gave him that and proceeded. Unfortunately, with me things don’t end such way, that guy had gone but as it always happens to me my conscience started killing me when I started waiting for my dinner at the mess. I started thinking, well if he looked genuine to me, why the hell I didn’t give him money, even if he would have cheated me, I can certainly afford losing 40 rupees. If he was genuine my money would have helped him a lot. What is more important, that somebody got help or I don’t get cheated? Ideally it should be the former one, but as most humans do the latter had become important for me. The very concept that I am getting cheated and the money is not being used as you would have likde it to be psyches me out. Well, I started feeling bad about the whole incident. I could have asked some more questions, as one friend do in such situations so that he is certain of his conclusion no matter whether the conclusion is actually true. That way, at least his conscience doesn’t trouble him. In my case, actually even then my conscience will trouble me if I haven’t helped or later I find out that I had been cheated. In this case, I hoped with 10 rupees at least he can call somebody he knows and ask for help.
I don’t know, why but such incidents happen to me at quite a good rate, as I remember correctly almost once in a two weeks. Now, probably you will understand why I was such a skeptic even when I though the guy was genuine. I don’t understand this rate, is there something written on my head like “this guy will help you” or “you can easily fool this guy”. In Hyderabad largest percentage of such people asking for help will be those who went for Tirupati and lost or finished their money in between. And even after so much experience with such people I haven’t yet been able to decide whether most of these are crooks or genuine. Once I met one unique fellow, I came to know about his crookedness since one my of my roommates also happened to be asked for help by this guy. This person tells people that he is former government employee and then something happened for which he has filed some petition and then takes out a huge bundle of money and says he already has collected some money and needs last 10 rupees. I doubted him and didn’t give him money, but just a minute late saw one person giving money; and this guy asked my friend money 2 days after that.
I don't know what to do, but life is not easy anyways.