To Give or Not to Give

Sometime ago, there was this article cautioning pp about the "monks" (or something cant remember...) who were going around claiming they were from Thailand and asking people from donations as some of these pp are fraud. That made me kinda wary of such pp even though they were dressed in robes but their numbers seem to have dwindled since then.

On my way to work last Fri, I was walking towards my office @ Bras Basah Complex when I was kinda approached by this monk (oh well he was dressed in robes) who gave me this card with a pic of the Goddess of Mercy on it. I say "kinda" coz he appeared to come out of nowhere (i thnk he was behind a pillar) and just passed me the card. Caught unaware and thinking it was harmless, I took the card. He then pulled out this piece of paper which was a sort of donation card, where pp wrote their name, what they wish for and an amount of money was written down. I was quite shocked when I saw the paper as the amounts written were not small!! The lowest being $50 and the highest was a couple of hundred dollars. So anyway I wrote my name and he did a little prayer for me and then the monk asked me for a donation. I took out my wallet and gave him $10, BUT he, on seeing that I have a $50 note in my wallet asked me to donate more citing that other pp donated like $100 plus. When I said that I didn't have enough money, I noticed that he kept eyeing my $50 and proceeded to tell me that the lowest donation was $50!! I insisted that I didnt have enough money and he was still v persistant... asking me to donate $30 instead. When I again told him I have no money, he just took my $10 and left. I was like stunned!!!! Are monks supposed to solicit for funds in the first place?? Even so, he is not supposed to dictate how much I should donate isnt it?? Like what Dar said when I told him, all donations should be 随意 mah.

I have nothing against religious organisations soliciting for funds, but these kinda black sheep will only create a bad impression for other people; that is, IF he is a genuine monk in the first place. I am thnking that he just writes in the amounts himself so as to make others feel bad by donating so little; in the end when he walked off, I didn't even have the chance to write down the figure. I am now afraid that, he will say bad chants to me as he have my name... How now brown cow??