Smile! You're in a 3rd world country!

First of all, I really don't mean the title, or the post for that matter, to sound condescending (if you don't know what condescending means, we have nothing to worry about). If there's one thing I've learnt, it's that there rarely is genetically or categorically "bad" people. The system (or lack thereof) produces the people and their defining traits (as a people).

If you've been outside this (or any other) country for an extended period of time (anything more than six months will do), things get pretty interesting when you go back. You start seeing things as if they were completely new to you (unless you have extraordinary memory). You don't otherwise get a chance to see things in your city anew because you grow up in it.

One of the very first things I've noticed the first time I walked on the streets in Cairo is the people, more specifically the faces of the people.
No one is smiling! Absolutely no one!
I've wondered since then what makes people on the streets smile in Seattle when they cross paths with a stranger, after all, it should be lack of this thing, whatever it is, that makes people frowny on the streets of Cairo.
And I found out the hard way.

Yesterday, I went to take my car to run a few errands, only to find it with a flat rear left tire. It was obvious someone had done it, because the tire had not been leaking and both cars in front of and behind mine had the same rear left tire deflated.
While changing the tire, a passerby tipped me off.

I'd parked it by the school wall (there is a school across from my place) and apparently, the school bus drivers don't like it when someone does that (parks on the street around the school). So they deflate the tires to "teach them a lesson"...
That's not the sad part, the sad part is that there is nothing you can do about it...

Why would you smile walking around in a country where you have no rights, be it property, human, or otherwise?

At least I found my/an answer.