Category Archives: Discrimination

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Not Dead Yet. But Drowning For Sure. But Won’t Die. But Painful. But Will Make Me Stronger. But Sapping For Now. But Will End In A Week. But…

I haven’t been posting. I’m not dead yet, at least not as far as this blog is concerned. But what I am though is drowning in papers, page counts and preparation for exams. And I will be back with a vengeance, and it shall be all mine. Watch out for me next weekend.

In the meantime I leave my readers with a picture from the breakfast buffet at the Hilton, of an atrocity from the perspective of all the lefties of the world.

IMG_0588

PS. It was me who had just dished from the tray on the left, so it doesn’t count.

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What’s Left of the Day

I wake up.  I get off on the left side of the bed. I walk to the bathroom.  It’s time for a shave. I pick up my razor with my left hand and start to shave. I look at the razor.  The word “HYDRO” looks back at me upside down (Lefty 0-1 Righty).  Same old thing, what does one expect in this right-handed world, I thought to myself. Then I brush my teeth.  I look at the brush head. Pleasant surprise, the “Oral-B” looks back at me the right side up (Lefty 1-1 Right, and they mustn’t be selling very well). I was pleased. Time to take a leak. Flush handle is on the left.  Yes. Lefties take the lead (Lefty 2-1 Righty).

So down to the kitchen for some breakfast.  Tossed the bread into the toaster oven. Dials are on the right (Lefty 2-2 Righty). Gotta get some butter and kaya from the fridge. Fridge door opens left to right (Lefty 2-3).  Boil some water, make some coffee. Look at the tap, it’s on the right hand side for no good reason (Lefty 2-4 Righty).  I lift the mug to drink, and realize that, the sign “COEXIST” looks at me instead of shows itself off to the rest of the world (Lefty 2-5 Righty).

I swallow my toast indignantly.  Ah who cares about food.  I go up to the MacBook to check my blog stats.  Dang, mouse is on the right (2-6).  And dang, it’s contorted to fit the right hand (2-7). Power button is on the right (2-8).  So is the “Enter” key (2-9).  Pop in a CD. Slot’s on the right (2-10).  What’s left on the left then, ah the all-important “esc” key. That’s it, I’m leaving MacBook at home today.

Time for school. I hop on the bus.  Card transponder’s on the right (2-11). Thankfully, no more offence on the bus.  First class of the day, Todd Rogers’ Science of Behavior Change. He’s left-handed (3-11)!  A reprieve.  A short-lived one though, I realized, when I looked at at my own chair. (3-12).

The rest of the school day was same old same old, with right-handed professors cancelling out left-handed ones, but a remarkable proportion of left-handed profs, I must say.  Anecdotally, about 50% (Todd will scream “insensitivity to sample size!!” at this).  It soon brings me to the end of the school day, and I need to run to the bathroom again cos my classes were piled back to back to back (in return I get no classes Tuesday and Thursday, fair deal I reckon).  The sight that I saw in there pleased me somewhat.  (4-12).

Story’s not over though. The fact that I have seen 2 kinds of flush handles fixed on the left doesn’t sit well with me. As a lefty, I am not used to such graciousness.  So I googled “flush handle” and found that about half of the flush handle pictures that google brought up were on the left. Googling “urinal flush handle” brought up an even greater majority of handles on the left.  Now knowing how mankind works, the most plausible explanation dawned on me.  It must have been designed such that the master hand for most people handles the more important implement.

So make the final score Lefty 2-14 Righty.  A right thrashing for the lefty.

PS. I just had to share this picture that I encountered on my Google adventures.

I remember being in this situation once.  Now I was laughing uncontrollably that no fly painted in the urinal was ever gonna work.