Meaningful Encounters

JG was sharing with us the highlights of his week when he kinda mentioned in passing about a group of foreign girls visiting his all-guy educational facility.

Naturally, we asked him this age-old question:

The foreign girls pretty or not?

To which he answered:

You know, I actually didn't really have the time to notice that.

Which was an utterly strange, and puzzling behavior. I mean, how long does it take for you to notice if someone is physically attractive? Exactly.

JG pondered for a while, and in his calm, nonchalant manner, he explained that he didn't really understand what the girls were doing there in the first place. It was as if every month, the institution would receive a busload full of foreign girls who wanted to see what the center was all about. And basically, what happens was the girls would traipse around the place, taking photos of the classrooms and such, and chat with the guy students and exchange vital stats contact details.

"I just don't see the point of it all," he said gently. "I'd rather do something more meaningful with my time and have meaningful conversations rather than... flirt around."

He did share with them the things he believed in and asked them about the deep questions in life. But the girls were either not interested in that or couldn't really understand why this guy was behaving so differently from the other jocks.

The rest of us, closet advocate of flirts, gawked at him.

But somehow, we understood where he was coming from. And we respect the things he did to uphold the principles that he believed in with all his heart. We see his heart of integrity. And we learned from each other a thing or two. For him, how to talk meaningfully to those monthly visitors without freaking them out. For us, how to invest more of our time on people and activities that mean something to us, rather than on trivial pursuits.