Little Trouble in Big Jakarta

I've had a friend visit a few times over the last few weeks. The penultimate time they visited I walked her back to her car, which she left just behind the security gate, and someone had smashed the back window. She said not to worry and got her to insurance company to repair it. The last time she visited I walked her to her car at about 11pm and started to chatting to the security guys when she pulled up alongside us because someone had slashed two of her tyres. The security man said that the area was rife with vandalism and that she should park inside the gate in the future to avoid more mishaps. He then sent one of his boys on a motorbike to drive to a nearby garage.
             It took about an hour for the guy from the garage to unscrew each of the wheels drive them up the road on the back of his motorbike, repair the sidewalls -which is illegal in the UK- pump them up, then screw them back on again. On the last run we followed him up the garage for the bill and I clenched my teeth in anticipation of the rip off. As soon as he said the bill was £3.50 I became a gentleman and offered to pay for the repairs because I felt guilty it happened in my area.
          When she dropped back at the house I thought about the infamous double puncture I got from a pot hole in Birmingham. I ran down to a nearby tyre shop and they refused to serve me because it was 4:55pm. I offered them £30 to wait for me to take the wheel and off and they muttered something about 'company policy' and said 'unlucky mate.' All I wanted to do was buy tyres from them and give them money but they looked at me as if I had just walked in the room and farted then demanded someone stick their tongue up my nostril. Eventually I had to pay my breakdown cover company £75 because of some loophole in the contract I signed and they sent a bloke out, who arrived in two hours, and who dumped me and the useless car back at my flat.
           That experience was a long way off the bloke who worked for over an hour for £3.50 to get the car functioning again. Initially he asked what we'd like to pay and when we said whatever you want that was the first price he gave. The poor guy probably doesn't have a lot and looking back maybe I should have given him a tip but I was tired and not thinking straight as it was a hot night. Maybe having people like that around is a bit extreme but I did find myself laughing when I thought back to the service I received in the UK.