The Hall of Shamer
..
I applause those immigrants with fortitude making it in this country, I loath others who expecting a free ride. Working the system is smart, but taking advantage is entirely another matter. I’ve just met an ugliest and rudest man yesterday, on the tennis court: he’s playing with this youngster using a few very old balls, the color of the earth. My newly opened Penn 2 balls looked crispy and bright. As soon as they arrived, we found our 3rd ball is missing. We first looked to my left asked the two girls if they had our ball. No. Then we looked to my right, waited till their break, asked politely if they had our balls.
“No” scolded from the older man.
Simon was taken back at the hush tone. We looked around bit more, then saw the older man holding 3 balls, one bright mixed with couple of oldies.
“Pls, check if you have a new Penn 2 …” Simon said to him.
“Go away.” He told Simon.
I couldn’t exactly know what he’s talking about with the heavy accent (Russian?), but have good idea what he’d said. So I told the youngster,
“Pls, ask your grandpa to give back our ball.”
The youngster said something in their native tongue, and he still refused.
Simon started walking into their court and he got agitated and telling Simon to get lost. Now I was mad and felt violated. Did he think he could just walk into the court, and playing with other people’s balls? Didn’t he have any of his own? Pun aside, he might get a lot of free rides from Uncle Sam, but Auntie Irene wasn’t willing to provide him any.
Sports, or tennis in particular is very gentlemanly game, we go out of our way to be courteous to other players. Here he’s, boorish and disrespectful. How could he gets to that age without acquiring a little grace and manner? What kind of the world did he grow up? As we were conferring, Xiao Lee showed him our remaining 2 balls,
“Look … see if you have Penn 2 ..”
The monster grabbed one from Xiao Lee’s hand and walked away! (Xiao Lee with all his hitting power, did nothing … was powerless, lol) … in the end, the animal returned our ball.
I’ve been playing on the city parks for a long time and never ever encountered such thing!
