There's Smileage in it

Travelling back to Doha filled me up with nostalgia. The trip must have been five years back now or then about a year and a bit since I quit my job at the Qatar Airways to move to Dubai. Getting myself comfortable in-flight I was super excited at the prospects of being back to the city which was home for over 2 years. I was also looking forward to meeting my cousins and their lovely daughter. So you can understand my disappointment when I was told at the immigration that I cannot enter the country as they had just implemented a rule which prohibits re-entry for 2 years for anyone who had cancelled their visas.

To this date I cannot figure out why anyone would have such a rule, but that is not the story. Walking into the immigration with my husband who did not have any problem getting in, I was devastated to hear that I need to fly back to Dubai and was an absolute bummer for both of us. We asked if we could meet someone more senior to reason it out. After a short wait when the manager arrived, I was fuming with anger and did not even bother to extend slightest of courtesy or to listen to what he had to say. I just lost my cool as any normal person would (?).

The answer was NO. As I was on the verge of tears, the ever so polite hubby pitched in and requested them to try one last time if possible by speaking to their supervisor. One of the biggest gift that god has bestowed him with is a calm head. And the rest was magic

Voila! All it took was his gentle words and a sweet smile, my passport was stamped. That very instant I realised my mistake and I felt so ashamed of myself, plus got an earful I got from the hubby. I could have put down plenty of reasons for my arrogant behaviour, but I didn’t once think that how difficult a job is especially when you are meeting people like me almost every day or once every hour.

 That was a big lesson for me and from then on, I have practised the art of smiling and being polite with people I meet, be it a cashier, the cleaning boy, my neighbours, taxi drivers and the list will go on. I am sure many people would even thought of me as a mad lady just randomly smiling at them.

Don’t get me wrong I haven’t turned to a saint by any stretch of imagination and still lose my cool occasionally but have reformed myself a great deal along with the improved odds of getting things done. This helps me get freshest of veggies, even if they are not on the shelf, free coffee, free clean-up of stained car seats, discounts and extra special pedicure.

 Thinking about it, I have always seen my mum practice it and my mum-in-law who retired as head of nurse, talking of empathy, putting ourselves in other’s situation but that night I forgot all that since I was upset. It took me a proverbial slap on the face to recognise that.

I am sure we all have learnt a very popular phrase – Smile and the world smiles with you, weep and you weep alone! Remember it’s not that the people are bad, sometimes the situations are. A smile can even sometimes make the impossible, possible!