So here I was, lining up to buy my breakfast from the Holland Village Hawker Centre. I was meeting my friend C to catch up over a breakfast meal. C decided to buy 'economic bee hoon'. I decided that since I was going to have a buffet pig out at the Ritz Carlton later in the afternoon, I would take something 'lighter' on the tummy.

I went up to the Chicken Hor Fun store. In front of me was a strapping young chap, probably in his mid twenties. He was waiting for the store owner to whip up 2 plates of Dumpling Noodles. I noticed that he was wearing a fitted french cuffs shirt and tailored pants ( I glanced quickly at his pants, lest I be mistaken for...). Hair was nicely spiked up, portraying a spunky image of a yuppy. Whipping out his unmistakably branded pure leather money clip, he slid out a $10 note and then threw it onto the counter...flippantly.

Hmm.

That was a strange way to hand over money, I mused.

As if to reinforce my observations, the store owner --- a middle aged lady --- asked spunky yuppy if he had 50 cents. Spunky yuppy dug into his pants pocket and fished out some coins. After sifting out 50 cents in his palm, he threw the coins onto the counter once again, splaying the coins all over the counter.

I was highly intrigued --- what kind of character throws money onto the counter in such a flippant and 'bo chap' way? Store owner lady had to reach over from her end and individually pick up the coins. Interestingly, the throwing of the coin was not done in contempt --- it was done so naturally that if I had pointed it out to Spunky yuppy, he would not have noticed what he did.

As he carried his food away, my observations continued swimming in my mind. As I handed over the money to the store owner lady, I...Hey wait a second!

I handed the dollar note to the store owner!

I consciously froze that moment in time into my brain, and replayed that scene in my mind --- I handed the money over to the lady. I did not throw the money.

Human behaviour, to me, is worth examining. Now, I am not concluding that I am morally more in tune, just because I 'handed over' the money rather than throw the money onto the counter. For all you know, I could be a wife beater, child molestor...you get the drift (watch Criminal Minds and you know what I mean). However, my question is this - why couldn't Spunky yuppy just simply hand the money over to store lady? By splaying the money all over the counter, it was inconveniencing her. Not too nice.

And so I propose the following reasons why he did what he did:


a) Spunky yuppy is spoilt and treats hawkers with disdain.

b) Spunky yuppy does not like to physically handle money as dollar notes and coins contain billions of germs.

c) Spunky yuppy has a tick and instinctively throws money when his hand comes in contact with them.

d) Spunky yuppy was raised by a couple of wolves and does not know basic social manners.



That aside, I should really track him down to find out who his tailor is.