Rude People Surprise Me

People can surprise you. Not necessarily in their beliefs, but in their actions. I am always surprised at rudeness and racism. I just don't understand it. Maybe I'm just wired differently from so many others, but I don't understand why some people have such a hatred for other people. And how they can be so rude. I just don't get it.

As you may have read in a previous entry, I attended my friend Anley's wedding this weekend. And as you may have read, Anley's family is from India, and she had a very large wedding, over 700 people were there. And it was a very culturally different experience for me.

Anley had her wedding at Villa Lombardi's in Ronkonkama on Long Island. And it was a BEAUTIFUL facility, the hall was beautiful, the food was excellent, the grounds were beautiful, and most of the service was pleasant, and wonderful. The reason I say most of the service is because there was one member of the staff who did not fit into that beautiful, wonderful setting. She was the lady who worked in the bathroom.

This lady was older, I'm not sure how old, but definitely a senior citizen, Probably in her 60's. She was mean, rude, crotchety, racist, bitter, and disgusting. All throughout the reception, if you went to the bathroom, she made rude, snide, racist comments. "By the time they lift up their outfits, the party will be over" "If you take that shawl thing off your outfit might be beautiful" "These people have been giving me such trouble, messy and disgusting they are" "I'm slaving to keep this bathroom clean for them and they don't even say thank you, they just make a bigger mess" Some of the toilets were difficult to flush, because the push button was hard to press. I had difficulty with it. One older lady asked me as she came out of the stall how to flush the toilet, she couldn't do it. I told her the button was hard to press you just need to press it hard. So the rude lady, came over and nastily said to the woman "I'll just do it, I've been flushing toilets for you people all day, once more won't hurt" Then she turned to me and said "I can't believe these people can't even flush a toilet, they've been so rude all day, and such mess, without even a thank you." Well ya know what, if I had been treated like that I wouldn't have offered her a thank you either. Although, I saw no reason for this woman to be so resentful, no one was rude to her.

For me, as one of the very few Caucasian persons at this affair, she was perfectly nice to me, but rude to Madhavi, when we, as women do, go to the bathroom together. She was rude as I saw it to almost all of the wedding guests.

Now, I know that this was a large reception, and it may have been overwhelming for this one bathroom worker, but as far as I could see, no guest was overly rude, no guest made a huge mess, there was no more mess than at any other reception I'd ever been to. No paper towels were left around, nothing was thrown on the floor, the sinks weren't even very wet and splashed. Everyone was polite, yet appalled at this lady's behavior. This is her job, to clean the bathroom at events like these. If she doesn't like it then she shouldn't do it. The facility is able to handle parties of this scale, if not they would not accept the reception, so you would figure that she must on some level be used to large parties.

I did not see any reason for her to be rude to the guests, this was someone's wedding and her family should be able to enjoy the reception and go to the bathroom without any negativity. If this lady wants to be a racist, as much as I disagree with that, I guess she has the right to believe what she wants. But if she is going to be working at a banquet facility, she should learn to leave her personal feelings at the door and just do her job.

As far as I'm concerned, there was absolutely zero excuse for her rudeness, comments and bad attitude. Like I said before, maybe I'm wired differently, but I just don't understand rudeness for the sole reason of difference. But maybe I just expect too much from people.