It was a usual Tuesday evening, and I was heading towards to the laundry shop or most commonly know as the dobi shop in Malaysia.

As I was busy unloading my clothes into the washing machine, I saw an old man entering the shop. I usually see often at the same spot. He always carries his soft drink can with him and he mingles around with everyone.

We usually exchange a few words as I wait for my laundry to get done. Usually he asks me lots of personal question like where do I stay, what are my parents working as, etc, etc.

I either usually just go with the flow and try not to reveal much too information about myself. In today’s world you cannot trust anyone.

So I thought to myself today, I must try not to spark a conversation with him. In my mind I labelled him as a very ‘kepoh chi’ (busybody) person.

I then started making a few calls to my fiends trying to avoid or have minimal conversation with him.

The odds were not on my side today. There was something wrong with my phone line and I could not continue speaking to my friends. So I had no choice but to just sit down quietly.

As soon as he saw me getting off my handphone, he immediately took the chance to talk to me.

This time it was different.

He spoke about himself. He told me that he was going to perform the haj pilgrimage in Makkah and he was sharing his experience with me.

He was expressing his fear of flying to me. I sat there just listening to his expressive words. He told me to pray for his safety as he shared a few things with me.

The thing that struck me most was that he mingled with me so freely.

He could also have thought the same things as I had thought about him. He has no worries in his heart. He did not judge anyone by their manner of speech.

Even though he is a Muslim and I am an Indian, he shared his beliefs with me and even asked for my opinion on it. This clearly proves that we Malaysian are indeed united.

In this world nowadays we have our guards up 24/7 we tend to not speak to many people because we are scared of them. This incident taught me a good lesson. Try to let your guard down at times and mingle around with people.

There is a lot to learn from them.

My laundry was done and it was time to bid my new-found friend goodbye. As I said goodbye to him he hugged me and said will shall meet soon in the same place. I wished him luck for his journey on the haj and drove back home.

Humanity still exist among us. All we have to do is just look for it. That’s all.