I have observed a couple of unrelated incidents today and yet I felt they were tied together under a banner of “acceptance”.
Firstly, in the morning, a homeless woman on the train sat on a three seater bench. She took the first seat thus block remaining two seats. Despite the carriage being full and many people had to stand no one dared or wanted to seat next her. She looked rough but otherwise seemed clean. Finally, a young man excused himself pass her and sat next to the window. She certainly did not like it and made sure he, and other people on the train knew about it. Admirably, he kept his cool. To my surprise, the woman preferred to stand up as she was not prepared to share the seat with anyone. I thought, she should have been glad he accepted for who she was and did not make any fuss about it. Obviously such acceptance meant nothing to her.
Few hours later a similar situation. A homeless man on a three seater bench was half laying across it watching a game of chess. Two Japanese ladies sat next to him. They have exchanged looks and all of them kept watching the game. Acceptance in this case was probably irrelevant as the interest in something in common was of higher importance.
