Disappointed at myself
It’s fucking official.
I still have a long way to go before I indeed become the person I portrayed myself as in my Wharton essays.
Yesterday, after getting off from work around 10 pm, I realized that I needed to buy food for Casper, so I decided to cross the street to get to the market nearby. (In Seoul, you usually have to take an escalator down to subway station and then you have to go through station and up to cross a big street.)
As I was about to take escalator down, there was this drunk guy in his mid 40’s reeling on the street right in front of me. I am not a saint (or trying to be one) by any means, but in the past, I have often helped many drunk guys in the past by making sure that they go home. Besides, it is etiquette here in Korea that whenever you see some old drunk guy wandering on the street (pretty common sight at night in Korea), younger guys should step up and help the person get home by calling a cab for the person and giving the driver the direction to his home.
However, yesterday, for whatever the strange reason is, I decided to ignore him. I wasn’t in a hurry at all, but I decided that buying dog food was more important than helping him (which, by the way, would have taken only 3~5 minutes even in my very conservative calculation.)
Then the disaster happened.
A few seconds after getting on the escalator down, I heard a footstep. Apparently, he also decided to take the escalator down. With my back turned on him, I then heard some loud stumbling sound, and I saw him falling flat on his face on the escalator. Unaware of the magnitude of his injury, I barked at him, “Hey, get up! This is not the place to sleep. You should go home!” He wasn’t answering back.
Then, I realized that he was unconscious - without any movement. Soon, there was a massive amount of blood dripping down all over the place, from his nose, from his mouth, and even from his ear. Panicking, I shouted to call for help.
With the help of another person (he didn’t mind getting his jacket stained with the blood. But I think I did.), I got him off the escalator to the ground and called “911.” I completely panicked. It didn’t take a long for me to realize that I completely fucked up in the first place.
He remained unconscious until the emergency medic arrived in 15 minutes (!) With a dozen people around us, I just wanted to get the fuck out and hide from everyone. I felt bad. No, I felt guilty.
Most of all, I am really disappointed with myself.
With all the fucking BS I wrote on my Wharton essays about how "a great leader" I am, how "a willing team player" I have been, and all those other fucking self-moralizing propaganda I put down on my essays, I just, outright, self-contradicted myself in this situation.
I mean, it wasn’t that I wasn’t paying attention to him in the first place or I wasn’t aware of what was happening at the time. The sad part is that I knew clearly what was about to happen and exactly what I was supposed to do in the situation. And the decision I made at the end was simply to ignore the guy and mind my own fucking business.
Fortunately, after a few minutes, he regained his consciousness, talking and moving his hands, and the medic staff safely took him to hospital at the end. But this is not the morale of the story.
I am still upset at myself as I am writing this. What I did yesterday clearly called for some deep introspection on my part to evaluate the way I have been dealing with things in life.
I question whether my supposed “greatness” is actually the result of my own self-moralizing BS I have been brainwashing myself with. Even if I want to find justification for my inaction yesterday, I really can’t. How can you justify yourself when you know you ignored the opportunity to do something?
One fucking ironic thing is that after police came and wrote down the report, he told me, with a deep sense of gratitude, that I was being “a good citizen” by taking “an initiative” to help the guy.
Unfuckingbelievable.
posted by DaRaverLA at 11:06 AM
7 Comments:
You were being a good citizen... your hesitation, or the thoughts in your head -- you still stepped up and helped, right? In the end what really matters is what we do, and the impact we have on others. You helped. That should be your take away. -- reflectionary http://inthemirror.blogs.com
Raver:
I'm not going to say it's OK and you're being too hard on yourself, because only you're allowed to judge yourself that way. We all hold an intrinsic standard within ourselves; we all have our own set of values, and you should keep firm to your own standards.
That said, I also think that many people would have done less. Many people would have pretended that the drunk wasn't there in the first place. It's not their business and stopping to help costs more time than it's worth. And people who behave and think this way aren't bad. They're just everyday people.
I also think that few would have had the self-awareness and strong moral values to stop and ponder his actions as you have, and I think it's a true sign of leadership when you WANT to be better, and you demand more of yourself than you would of others.
So if you're not there yet, I think you've shown definite signs that you CAN be.
Sincerely,
Meg
dude, relax. if someone was always there to catch him, how would he learn that getting piss-ass drunk isn't a smart idea?
i only wish you'd videotaped the stumble and posted it on the internet...it would have spread like wildfire. ha!
I am sorry but I feel you are beating yourself unnecessarily over this incident. I maybe a little callus, but I think I have seen too many poor, destitue, homeless people living the worst possible kind of life you can imagine to really let small things like this bother me. I know it comes across as pretty hard but you have to experience life in one of Asia's poorer countries to really understand what I am talking about.
Now if it was a child who was left alone and you noticed but allowed to get into an accident, it is a completely different thing. But a drunk over 40 years and under 70? I would first off not want to get involved in case he got abusive or mean tempered. I realize people fall through the cracks but that is the sad and unfortunate part of life.
People who talk about involving themselves in every tiny little incident that happens have probably NEVER seen situations where your story is as common as the air we breathe.
In my view the police man was right you were concerned, you did help, and you were a good citizen. The rest is as a result of too much introspection and idealistic dreams.
Megami: I understand that everyone needs to abide by his/her individual standard. The only catch is that each person also needs to be careful not to be condescending other to his/her own standard at the same time. Definetely easier said than done.
Aregon23: Of course. The whole point I am trying to make here is that if I fail to act on what I need to act on even in this "self-presented" opportunity, what kind person would I be?
I am not trying to be a saint. I know that they are starving kids/homeless people out there I am ignoring at this time.
But before I worry about those kids, I gotta find a way to be CONSISTENT with how I should behave in my social/personal life. I mean, it is a common etiquette here in Korea to help drunk people. Younger people do that all the time! (seriously)
And I dont think I am behaving in the way consistent with what I am saying to others and to myself. This is the primary reason for me getting upset with myself.
To digress this topic further, during my interview, I boasted to the adcom that the No. 1 quality I would bring to Wharton is my "personal integrity."
And what now?
Going back to your original point about helping those homeless people, I basically see the idea of helping them a far-fetched notion currently given the state of attitude I have. (as much as I really want to fulfill my part eventually)
In short, the whole situation was rather a revelation to me.
I guess it is a cultural thing. Very interesting no doubt. A couple of years ago, I was driving in San Francisco at around 2 in the morning. At a traffic light an old drunk stood begging for food. Considering that everyone in the car had just dropped upwards considerable sums of money on the nights reveals, we felt obliged to drop some money in his arms. Just then the light turned green and our car started to move. It was then that the old man decided the money we had given him was not enough, he got mad, started cursing us and luckily we had started to pick up speed when he lifted his hand and threw a liquor bottle at our car, which if it had hit the window would have definitely hurt one of us.
That was positively the LAST time I stopped to give money to any drunk. And you can see why I don't think you did the wrong thing there. Like I said earlier, if it had been a kid who was in the same situation, I would have been disappointed in you if you hadn't helped but a drunk?
I think your work with the juvenile jail speaks for itself as far as personal integrity is concerned.
I think wev'e all been in a situation where we knew we could have done more to help somebody. But at the end of the day, you have to pick and choose the fights to fight.
The best thing to do is to reflect (which it looks like you're doing) and come out of this situation a stronger individual.
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