Back in the day, parents would always advise their kids against taking anything from people, most especially strangers, and also if that thing happens to be something edible. But the economy of the country has gotten a bit harder than it was back in the day, and now, the advise isn't against collecting stuff from people, but instead being careful when you do.
It just goes to show you how rotten the system has gotten where there is no more trust, not even among friends anymore. Everyone now makes sure to double check before doing anything with anyone that has even the slightest possibility of ending their lives.
Earlier today, one of our neighbours had walked up to I and my friend and while we all were having a conversation, he had mentioned that he hadn't eaten since morning and the time was around 4pm in the evening.
Well, it turned out that my friend had some leftover bread in his room and he had asked the dude if he would eat the bread, to which the guy immediately said yes. When my friend went upstairs to bring the bread, I noticed he had collected one slice from it and purposely ate it in front of everyone, as if saying "look, the bread isn't poisoned".
I noticed it but didn't say anything about it because no one else did, but I couldn't help but wonder how we got to that stage where the first thing that comes to mind when trying to help someone is showing everyone that the food isn't poisoned.
Something similar to this same situation happened some few days ago when a lady had helped one of my neighbours to cook at home, and after cooking, she had told him that she didn't have any appetite to eat the food because she happen to be one of those people who don't like to eat food that they had cooked themselves. But funny enough, my neighbor had refused to eat that food either and insisted that the lady ate it first because he was trying to be on the safe side of things and was trying to make sure that the food was safe for him to eat.
That entire situation ended up causing a huge riff in their friendship because they both had a reason to be upset. One felt bad that the other was suspecting her of poisoning him, while the other felt bad that she had refused to eat the food that she had cooked herself.
It just goes to show us how bad everything in this world has gotten where no one trusts anyone anymore, even when we're the ones asking for their help.