Fair. What is fair?

Fair. What is fair? We all like to think we are fair and reasonable people who go about our daily business trying to do our best. We paint walls of the old-age home on Mandela Day and for 67 minutes bring hap to the hapless.
We never chase away the endless stream of schoolchildren who stick smudged raffle sheets under our noses and shyly ask us to part with R2 so we can have a chance to win half a sheep.
We even sometimes buy bread for the irritant on Beaconsfield Street.
We like to think ourselves as fair and reasonable people – unless of course you are some kind of miserable nutcase who is generally nasty, and who makes Scrooge look like a pre-primary school teacher.
But then again, how fair are people to you? Is it fair that you have to contend with endless phone-calls from breathless call centre operators who are always quick to warn you that they are recording your every word?
I wonder why? Maybe call centre operators have a get-together every Christmas and have a chance to play their recordings to each other in the hope of winning a prize for handling the best insults thrown at them from those on the other side of the phone.
Is it fair that some pay TV licences, while others are ‘pirate viewers’ and know that no license inspector will ever darken their doorway as they live on the top of some mountain?
Is it fair that some people feed their parking meters in town, while others operate their vegetable-selling businesses from their bakkies parked in public parking bays?
Is it fair that some oke from Orkney wins the Powerball after spending his last R21 on cigarettes, while you can’t even win the half-sheep from the school raffle? Is it fair that those who park in front of the Big House at Princess Magogo Building double-park their big SUVs with gay abandon, while you sukkel to even get into the parking bay in front of the chemist?
Is it fair that some fellow with political connections and a hazy ‘studying towards qualification’ gets some hotshot job at some municipality while you can’t even get a ‘piece job’?
It makes you turn from tender to well done and bitter at the stroke of a tender signature. Is it fair that some large men in ill-fitting suits have swarms of bodyguards around them, while old Blondie just parks in front of the church on Gladstone Street, wrapped in his equally ill-fitting blanket?