Hi, I’m Sam,
I like to
think that I’m a nice guy and I think I’m also a people pleaser; I’m beginning
to learn not to displease myself to please other people. All was good until I
nearly choked to death and still didn’t complain because I was trying to be a
nice person.
A few weeks
back, I was sick and I went to the hospital, did tests, and was placed on a
morning and night routine medication. I was asked to take one of the medicines
30 minutes before eating and the other one 20 – 30 minutes after eating because
I would probably throw up if I took them so close to eating. I always try my
best to be a good patient because firstly I’m an adult and I don’t need anyone
to beg me to take my medicine I want to get better and secondly, I live alone
and will not like to get worse at night when I’m alone.
3 days into
taking my medicine judiciously, I came home from work that day and realized I
didn’t have any food at home, I also forgot to order something and I needed to
eat something before and after my medicine; I decided to step out to look for
something to eat because I didn’t want to skip taking the medicine that night.
I strolled a little and stumbled on a “restaurant”, I wanted to eat swallow, so
I asked for what they had. They had my favorite soup, Egusi soup, but didn’t have
garri and I don’t eat any other swallow except garri; so there goes my swallow
craving. Then I asked for jollof rice.
10mins later,
she walked up to me with a plate of jollof rice, dropped it on the table before
me, and asked me if I wanted anything else, I answered “No” and she left. I
took a closer look at the food and realized it was a warmed plate of stale
jollof. I didn’t know exactly how to react or what to say, I didn’t want to
seem rude and I’ve never sent food back before, I just shut up and eat whatever
I’m given as though I don’t have to pay for it with my own money.
I couldn’t
call her back to take the food because I didn’t want to put her in a weird position and I didn't have the strength to look for another place to eat, so I started to eat the food, then I decided to take I bite of the meat, hopefully
that will add to my motivation to finish the food. As I put the meat in my
mouth it was cold, not like frozen code but normal code because she couldn’t
bother to heat the meat with the food. Not only was the meat cold, but it was
STRONG, I couldn’t cut it with my teeth, so I kept the meat back and continued
eating the rice.
After I was
done with the rice, I decided to face the hardened meat and show it who the
boss was, I tried my best to chew the meat as a whole, but it was too strong,
so I made the dangerous decision to swallow the meat and the meat got stuck in
my throat; couldn’t go down to my stomach or come back out. I started to panic
because it was so uncomfortable and my eyes started tearing up, I suddenly
couldn’t breathe properly. I tried coughing out the meat, but it didn’t move,
tried swallowing harder, still didn’t move, and even tried punching my throat
hard, the stubborn meat still didn’t move. I then started to panic because this
was not going to be my end. The young lady was there staring at me scared and
didn’t know what to do, it was just the 2 of us in there and she was too stunned to go and call
for help as I was still struggling. So I decided to keep punching and trying to
cough hard and after like 5 hard coughs, the meat came back out and I released a
heavy and lasting sigh.
I sat back
down, wasn’t thinking about anything but was grateful to God that the whole
situation didn’t go the other way. I still paid in full but resolved that I was
going to learn to speak up when necessary and not care if I’m not going to be
labeled a nice person. The situation could’ve been avoided had I made my
concerns known immediately after I noticed the food wasn’t fresh. I decided
that day not to let being nice stop me from demanding good service anywhere I
find myself. I will find a polite way to say it but best believe I won’t be
shutting up going forward. If I have to send something back, I will. This was a
situation where I thought being seen as a nice person was more important than
my life and I will never let myself be in that position ever again.