A few months ago, a secretary in my office was fired from her job. She was accused of using money from our office without permission (or in her terms, “borrowing with unclear repayment schedule”) for her own personal needs.
I have known her about four years or so before I finally heard a bad rumor about her. She loves to borrow money from all her colleagues. But when it’s time to pay, she would pretend as if nothing ever happened. Only people who let her borrow money knew about her bad habits. Or perhaps, almost everyone knew but me. Anyway, one day she came to me to ask for a loan. As a secretary, she knew that my pocket was a bit full at that time, as I had just received money for my car loan. She said that she needed the money for her relative in hospital. It was about 5mio Rupiahs. I totally refused point blank. I almost gave away, but I wanted to use what was left from the loan for my holiday.
I was stunned when I told my colleagues about this and they told me I was lucky to not have given her the money. She has been known for borrowing money all over the place. Sometimes, her husband even called her colleagues to persuade them to lend the money. (What?) This event occurred in the year 2003.
In the following years, she kept on and on with her bad habits. Since we have all been there for God knows how long, she was unable to persuade us to lend her some money. So, she started with the NKOTB (if any of you do not know what this is, it means New Kids on the Block, dear). We were like, should we tell them earlier about her bad habits? But what would they think of us? They probably just think of us as old useless hags who like to talk bad things about others behind their back. Of course, knowing that they did lend her the money, we were wishing we had told them earlier.
I am now in the same situation again. I would like to inform somebody about this, but I am not sure whether this is the right thing to do. I do not wish this person to con my friends for his own benefit. However, I am questioning my own motives for letting this information out. Do I do that because I sincerely want to help my friend to avoid being cheated? Or is it my own intention to get even?
