Honest Cultures and Returning Lost Wallets

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If you saw a lost wallet on the street would you return it?
Reader’s Digest wanted to know which were the most honest cities in the world.
Mumbai india was number two with 9 out of 12 wallets returned.
Moscow Russia was number five with 7 out of 12 wallets returned.
Madrid Spain was number 15 with 2 out of 12 wallets returned.
And Lisbon Portugal was last at number 16 and least honest with 1 out of 12 wallets returned.
BTW Helsinki Finland was the most honest.
Why do you suppose that a Hindu country such as Mumbai, India scores so high in honesty and Madrid Spain and Lisbon Portugal score so low?

 
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I have no explanation. I haven’t traveled to India and cannot give any educated speculation. You brought up Indian being a Hindu country. Do you think that India’s case is somehow tied to the Hindu faith?

I am surprised because my understanding is that Moscow and Mumbai are both hard-hit by pick-pocketers. That leads me to wonder about the survey’s sampling methods.
 
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Why does Hinduism/Christianity have anything to do with it? Hindus aren’t inherently immoral.

As in everything, it probably has to do with how people were raised to behave.
 
We returned a wallet to a man that had left it on the gas pump at a local convenience store. No phone number inside, but his address was in it. We drove over to his house since it was nearby and my husband brought it to his front door. The guy took it, said, “oh,” but did not say thank you. 😳

I have also turned in money found in stores on the floor. I know that the person that dropped it may not get it back, but it’s not mine. I like to think that the person might come back and ask if anyone found it. It could be all the money they had.

I have no idea why one country is more honest than another. It will be interesting to hear what people say.
 
A man near where I live found a wallet full of cash - a lot of cash - dropped by a tourist. He took it to a police station. When they praised his honesty he said ‘I am a Muslim and this is what we do’. The man was a refugee and very poor. The police thought it worthwhile reporting it to the media.
 
India is a deeply spiritual country, and Hinduism has many good moral teachings — it is basically a religion of peace and co-existence. I once heard that when a Hindu was told about Jesus, he said “sure, that’s okay, your Jesus can be a god too”. Well, there’s a little more to it than simply “being a god”, but I think the anecdote shows that these are very decent, tolerant people. And there are some who say that Jesus visited India in his “hidden years” — how can we say that He didn’t? He may have.

As for Finland, it’s a wealthy, comfortable, decent, optimistic, well-educated, forward-looking country. The people there are basically content with their lives, and returning a lost wallet is just something they would do. My cousin emigrated to Finland and lived there for many years before he died. He had a very good life there.

I can’t speak for Spain and Portugal. They are taught the very same Catholic religion that the rest of us are.
 
I’ve found and returned wallets, a driver’s licenses, and a cell phone over the years. One wallet was actually dropped on a bike path by a guy who was here on a work Visa from some African country. So, figuring out how to contact him and return the wallet was a small adventure.
 
Is the “world” to whoever did this mean mostly Europe, one or two countries in Asia, nothing in Africa and only a couple cities in the Americas? With all the ads and clicking to get to the whole story it was difficult to read so maybe I’m missing something. If they are going to say the world they should have a better sample than this.
 
I agree with Salibi.
A lot of it has to do with family values and maybe not as much religion.
Sometimes religion can influence to have good values, but at same time I think the Bible mentions something too about the “law is written in men’s hearts”.
Indians are often family orientated and sincere in nature so they are raised well by their parents to do the right thing.
A lot of them are very hard working too so, just a guess, perhaps they were able to appreciate how much work went into earning that money and papers in the wallet and put self in the others shoes.
They understand the value of work.

I don’t know why Lisbon and Madrid would score so low but I’m interested to hear what other posters answer why.
 
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Is not returned necessarily stolen?

Couldn’t they have turned in somewhere that just never reached owner?
 
My daughter once did an experiment that showed you could post stamped letters as effectively by dropping them in the street as putting them in mail boxes. People just picked them up and posted them.
 
In the case of Lisbon, I’ve been there twice and the city has a serious theft/ pickpocket problem overall. Much of it related to drugs.

Having said that, the last time I found a lost wallet I did not try to call the person to whom it belonged, one reason being I was in a foreign non-English speaking country at the time. I turned it in to the gift shop at the place I was visiting, thinking the owner might come back to look for it. As I was leaving the place I saw a man pull up and frantically rush from his car and I suspected he was the wallet owner and I nonverbally pointed him to the gift shop.
 
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The ‘experiment’ in the article is not reliable at all. Same modest number of wallets (12) in each city. No adjustment for the total population in the city (Mumbay has over 18 million people living there, 12 wallets is nothing!!!; Helsinki, for comparison has only 0.6 million people living there), no indication about the areas in which the experiments was performed (tourist area with a lot of police around? Crime plagued neighborhood? Busy railway station? Fancy restaurant? Etc) or the time of the day (night? Middle of the day? Etc). How can people seriously draw conclusions from such a poorly planned experiment???
 
I found a lady’s purse left in a shopping cart. When I checked inside to learn the owner it turned out to belong to the mother of a neighborhood kid I grew up with. I returned the purse to her and her family was delighted. Seems mom was having the first signs of demensia.

But what are the odds you would find a lost item of someone you know in a very public place?
 
On a visit to a poor country once the zip gave way on my back pack in the street locals quickly gathered everything up,kindly placing everything back in,camera included.
Later visiting another neighbouring country I realised if the same thing had happened there things would have been snatched up and made off with in some of the back streets.And yet in the business area i was handed something of value that had dropped ,and told to take care.
It varies. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
 
About three years ago I found a mobile phone. I rang some of the saved numbers and left my number and later that day the owner rang me. I told him where I lived so he could pick it up. But he said - hey could you drop it off at my place? Say what…?

As it turned out, if I walked home from the station as I was planning to do when I went home then I’d pass quite close to where he lived. So I thought…well, he’s got some cheek, but it’s on my way so OK.

Got to his place - a block of apartments and rang his his bell. After a few seconds a window opened on tbe second floor, and a head appeared which said: ‘Got my phone? Great. Bring it up to 207 on the second floor’. Head went back inside and the window closed.

I stood there for a few seconds then walked off. And tossed his phone into the nearest bin.
 
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Yeah, I’m not going to anybody’s house. Unless it’s your neighbor a block away, or someone you know, that’s dangerous. I’d leave it at the nearest police station.
 
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