Adam Ryan Design

As a student, to keep myself surviving in the manner to which I have become accustomed (poor but not quite homeless), I have a part-time job that consumes my weekends while providing me with the money to afford rent, food, coffee, beer, Red Bull, and other essential University related things.

When I see some of the jobs students resort to in order to survive I realise that I’m quite lucky with my current employment. My job is not menial, pleb, slave labour, and I definitely don’t identify myself as a Minimum-Wage-Slave. Naturally there are frustrations over small issues as I’m sure there are with all jobs but at the bottom of it all it’s a pretty sweet gig.

Essentially what I do is monitor CCTV cameras and hunt for potential shoplifters. My official title is a “Loss Prevention Associate” which sounds like a fairly convoluted way to say ‘Security’. Lets face it, that guy that fills up your car is not a “Petroleum Transfer Engineer” (and yes I can make fun, I’ve done that job as well). But a large part of my job centres around deterrence, so I guess “Loss Prevention” isn’t such a bad way to describe it.

Without a doubt the best part of my job (apart from the awesome people I work with) is actually making an apprehension and knowing that someone who feels, for some reason that the law does not apply to them, will be punished. Recently because I only work part time I had managed to miss out on all the fun stuff. It seemed like the longest time since my last catch and I was beginning to get frustrated. Two weeks ago I made an apprehension that blew all my other catches out of the water as far as dollar value and craziness go. Naturally I was stoaked. That was until this week. Another catch and this one nearly doubled the value of the last one. But this time there was no post-apprehension buzz. Why not? The bust looks phenomenal on paper.

I have caught all kinds of people from a range of backgrounds. But this latest one made me think.
Why so many?
Why is a socio-economic trend not represented more strongly?
Why do they think they can get away with it?

But most strongly, I wonder if they care. Being left with questions like this bug the hell out of me. I don’t want to hear the “Nature vs. Nurture” debate, nor do I want to blame the Police or our legal system. I want the focus of this post to be aimed at the one’s who deserve to be under the microscope, or at least at the ones that need to look in the mirror.

The night I made that big catch my flatmate and I went to get curry for dinner from a restaurant in town. As we sat and waited for our take-away order I recapped the details of my day and the action from work. Naturally we ended up in a fairly involved conversation about what could drive people to steal. Our findings were that perhaps in some cases there was a ‘Robin Hood Clause’ in which stealing a loaf of bread to feed your starving family falls into a moral grey-area. The obvious counter argument to this was that New Zealand has one of the best social welfare systems in the world (even though I disagree with parts of it) that provides a safety net for those that do fall through the cracks of society. In fact, students are the only group that need to borrow to survive (but that’s another post for another day)!

So as we were all wrapped up in our wee conversation and the kind Indian man handed us our dinner we left the restaurant without paying. Stopping at a dairy on the way home and still in the middle of outlining a utopian justice system, we realised we had not paid for the food we were carrying. Without any hesitation the two of us knew we were going back to settle our bill and apologise for our mistake despite the fact we could have easily kept walking home.

But it simply was never and option for us!

We went back, said sorry, had a laugh about the situation and felt like knobs for a few minutes while basking in the delicious duality between our conversation and our oversight.

So that’s my angle… I am a member of New Zealand’s only social group that needs to borrow to live but that doesn’t change the fact that I know right from wrong. Everyone knows the law so regardless of upbringing, at some point, for a crime to be committed, someone has to CHOOSE to do so.

Recently I have spent a few hours on some of New Zealand’s domestic puddle jumpers. As I board the plane I am always reminded of “Fight Club” and “single serving friends”. About 3 years ago I had the joy of sitting next a 40-something businessman who was apparently doing quite well for himself. He was well dressed in a suit and within seconds of sitting down had introduced himself to me. His name escapes me now of course but that’s not the point of this post, we sat and chatted for the whole flight and he was genuinely interested in my studies and design work and told me about his flights around the world and adventures in foreign countries. His stories obviously dwarfed mine but it never felt like it was a competition. The flight landed in true bumpy tradition and our small Q300 rattled to a stop, we entered the terminal and went to our respective families saying nothing but sharing a mutual smile.

That was three years ago and my recent flights have not provided the same calibre of single serve friend, needless to say I am left with more than a few questions. I’m not sure whether it is the duration of the flight and that its easier for some people to sit in awkward silence for an hour trying not to make eye contact with the person next to you for fear of starting a conversation or that (and I hope its not) people just have no time for strangers…

Personally I can’t do it. I try to start a conversation… generic stuff like “Hey, how’s it going?”… “Have you had a good day?”… “What are your plans in destination ‘x’ (where ever the plane is going, I don’t actually refer to places as destination ‘x’)?”…. But nothing! People seem more interested in their magazine than interacting with other humans. At the risk of sounding like a cynic I just want to acknowledge that there could be some ‘Tyler Durden’ in the man from years back, in the sense that maybe my mind has perpetuated how cool he was to sit along with. But the fact remains that in my recent experience the best company I have had on any flight since then has been the hostess asking me for tea or coffee… at least that required an answer.

I want to put it down to the fact that the flights are so short that its easier for some people not to talk, or even that ‘Baby Boomers’ and the kids of ‘Generation X’ feel no connection to the youth of today. I’m even open to entertain the notion that people might think I have nothing to say. But that notwithstanding if a 21 year old can take the first step forward and open a dialog don’t I deserve more than a forced smile?

Maybe Ed Norton had it right… Should we all sit alone and invent our companions in Utopian solitude?