What the heck is it with Egyptians and BAD APPOINTMENTS???!!
I've just came back from an outing with some of my friends on the occasion of one of them being in vaccation for a month before she goes back to Kuwait ... AAAAND ... I had a dispute with one of them because i went to pick her up and she was about 15 min. late!!
I dunno wut happened to me these days .. before, i had trained myself to tolerate ppl being ALWAYS late. I'm a daughter of a man who'd rather be 30 min. early than be 5 min. late, and that was the way i was raised, until by time and bad experiences with ALWAYS late ppl, i became a "rather be 30 min late than be ON TIME to find NOBODY there" person!!! But then, because i meet a lot of foreigners, the only comment i ALWAYS hear is "EGYPTIANS ... VERY BAD APPOINTMENTS!" .. they say this and i feel like it's a spit on my face ... simply because IT'S TRUE ...
we have no value for time ... u spend half ur day between traffic jams, awaiting transportation, awaiting a meeting to start, awaiting the elevator AND awaiting PEOPLE! And now, i just can't
tolerate this, because when someone gives me an appointment and they come late, i instantly recall wut foreigners say and i get irritated ... i'm proud to be an egyptian .. but in this ... It's simply shamefull! why can't we simply keep one damn appointment?!!!
you know, in all time management courses they tell you this: try to spend one week writing every single thing you do during every second of your day .. and at the end of the week, take a look at your notes and judge for urself how much time is wasted ... i challenge you, most of
the time wasted is wasted in WAITING!
Btw, this reminds me that the last time management course i attended, the lecturer came TWO AND A HALF HOURS LATE! What an irony! I couldn't just stand listening to HIM telling us HOW TO MANAGE OUR TIME!
And how come that we Muslims do that? I mean, we should be the most organized ppl ... our day is divided into specific intervals indicated by the five prayers ... you can manage ur whole life just by defining wut you should do in between the five intervals .. how easier could it be?
Besides, to give an appointment is a kind of giving your word for being in a certain place at a certain time ... it's a promise ... doesn't Allah say in the quraan "... and fulfill every engagement, for every engaement will be inquired into (on the day of judgement)" [Al Israa 17-34] ...and didn't the prophet (pbuh) say that there are three signs for a hipocrate: that if he speaks he lies, and if he promise he breaks his promise and if he's trusted he breaks his trust? And doesn't Allah say in surat As-saff [61-3]: " Grievously hateful is it in the sight of Allah that ye say that which u do not do" ... why can't ppl look at it from this side? it's breaking an appointment is breaking a promise ... how disliked is that for Allah and his messenger?
Once, Amr khaled was saying in one of his lectures that at the day of judgement, your life will be like huge locker, containing smaller and smaller lockers ... and so on ... each locker stands for a moment or a second in ur life ... and every locker/moment will be opened to see wut you did with it ... how can we be standing there and see all our lockers full of such crab .. waiting, waiting, waiting and waiting ...!And Imam Hassan Al basry says: "Every sun that rises would say: Oh son of Adam, I'm a new day, and a witness on your deeds, so take advantage of me because you'll not see me again until judgement day!"
In summary, whether ur the one who's late or your the one who's waiting, u r both losing!
2 comments:
*bursts out laughing*
im sorry, but this is so true. When i came to live and work in cairo i didnt expect people to be soo bad at keeping apointments. To me, beeing a swedish woman, if you set a time for a meeting, you go there about 5-10 minuts ahead of time so that you have a few minuts to get organized in before the meeting.
To my amazement the work day (that oficialy started at 9) usualy started around 10 or so, or when people whanted to drop by, i was there 8 every morning to start things.
We booked times for meetings, were people just didnt bother showing up, or came an hour or two late.
My boss whas happy when i started there, hoping that my sence of time would influence the others, but even after several discusions about the importatns of beeing on time, it never worked out that way.
hehehe ...
in the last two lines i thought you'd say "but after several discusions about the importatns of beeing on time, i became convinced that i should integrate within the egyptian society and start my work at 10 like everyone else!!" LOL!
It's really disappointing, isn't it ... when you try and try to convinvce people and they can't just care less. I think, like i said, it's because we have no value for time ... if you have a billion dollar, would you care about losing a few pounds? or even a few hundreds? ... the problem is, this is an illusion .. we do NOT have all the time in the world .. coz we'll be judged for every single second and like the prophet(pbuh) said "No man shall witness the Day of Judgment without being asked about four: His life and how he spent his time, his youth and how he took advantage of it, his knowledge and how he disposed of, and his money, from where he had earned and for what he had spent it."
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