u/OkCricket3746

Look at Lionel Messi. For years he was heavily criticized by Argentina fans. He was accused of not caring enough, lacking leadership, and failing to reproduce his club form for the national team. He even stepped away from international football after the disappointment of 2016. Yet he never responded by demanding respect. He kept showing up, kept working, and eventually grew into the leader that his teammates followed. His humility, consistency, and leadership—culminating in Copa América titles and the 2022 World Cup—changed the way the team viewed him.

Cristiano Ronaldo's story shows a different side of the same lesson. His achievements are extraordinary but his confrontations with coaches, teammates, and clubs have sometimes overshadowed them. His recent tension with Portugal's coach is another example of how easily a player's legacy can become entangled with questions of ego and authority.

Talent can make people admire you. Achievements can make people applaud you. But humility, character, and the way you treat others are what make people genuinely respect you.

You can demand attention. You can demand authority. But you can never demand genuine respect.

Posted this in another subreddit. This is a pretty long story of my life, so I thought I should share here. I am leaving out a lot of the details. So please bear with me. It has a small happy ending.

For context, I’m from a 3rd world country where politics has a huge amount of influence over pretty much everything, including universities. A lecturer (let’s call him Big Looser) joined our department with strong political connections to the then-ruling party. At first, we had no problem with him. But things changed when he started manipulating our lecturer recruitment system so that some of his close political allies, either from his university or his batch, could get hired at our university. Eventually, they created an internal clique with some students and started manipulating students results so that the next generation of teachers could also be recruited from within their clique.

The students who were basically their lapdogs would receive good marks from all the teachers involved in the clique. The student with the highest grade during the first two years suddenly fell behind five other students simply because he wasn't part of the clique. Other students were seriously affected too because many students dreamed of becoming professors, and being among the top students was one of the pathways toward that career. Our grading system was 60% written exams and 40% practical work like presentations, assignments, midterms, etc. The problem was that the clique controlled teachers could give you such terrible marks in that 40% portion that doing well in the written exams didn't matter much. The clique was so entitled that they genuinely acted as if they owned the entire department. They would harass or bully students, and if someone didn't act as they wanted, they could get one of their teachers to, target, scold or intimidate them with other issues.

I was involved with the student opposition party during my first two years, so they also deliberately dragged down my grades. Eventually, I quit all student political activities for my own safety as the ruling party and this clique were becoming an autocratic force that I couldn't deal alone. Unfortunately, leaving politics didn't help much because the damage to my first two years' results couldn't really be reversed through supplementary exams. Even if I retook the written exam, the practical marks stayed the same. So, basically, I was screwed.

Now this story has a bit of happy ending. After we graduated, two of our batchmates who were part of the teachers clique became lecturers themselves, through bribes and the political connections of the Big Loser. One of this batchmate (let's call him Creepy looser) had been creepy toward girls since our university days. We used to joke that there wasn't a female student, senior or junior, that he hadn't tried to get into a relationship with. Once he became a teacher, however, it stopped being just creepy and became an abuse of power. He started approaching female students and using grades and thesis supervision as leverage to pressure them. Eventually, a brave female student filed a complaint with the department head because her final thesis (required for completing her bachelor's degree) was allegedly being rejected because she refused his inappropriate advances. Now guess who the department head was at that time? The Big Looser! By then, he had become an associate professor.

Instead of properly investigating the complaint, Big Loser tried to make the whole thing disappear. He sweet talked the student, sympathized with her and offered to personally accept her thesis if she agreed not to pursue the complaint further. She didn't back down though. One day, she secretly recorded her conversation with Big Loser in his office and shared the recording in our university groups. She then formally complained against both Big Loser and Creepy Loser. After that, lots of other female students also came forward and shared their chat and messenger screenshot of inappropriate advances by the Creepy Loser. Apparently, he had tried his luck with numerous female students, both from our department and from other departments across the university. Also I should mention that the creepy Loser was already married with a child when all of this was happening.

The story blew up and became national news in my country. Students started protesting, and eventually the university permanently dismissed Creepy Loser and temporarily suspended Big Loser. Then came another plot twist. After some time, the ruling political party lost power and the opposition came into government. Big Loser's political protection disappeared. As far as I know, he is still out of a job and has no way of returning to our university. Don't know where the creepy looser is. He disappeared from the radar. All the other people from their clique is still alright though. Hopefully, karma catches up with them someday too.

Just read a story about an entitled professor here, so I thought I'd share ours. This is a pretty long story, and I am leaving out a lot of the details. So please bear with me. It has a small happy ending.

For context, I’m from a 3rd world country where politics has a huge amount of influence over pretty much everything, including universities. A lecturer (let’s call him Big Looser) joined our department with strong political connections to the then-ruling party. At first, we had no problem with him. But things changed when he started manipulating our lecturer recruitment system so that some of his close political allies, either from his university or his batch, could get hired at our university. Eventually, they created an internal clique with some students and started manipulating students results so that the next generation of teachers could also be recruited from within their clique.

The students who were basically their lapdogs would receive good marks from all the teachers involved in the clique. The student with the highest grade during the first two years suddenly fell behind five other students simply because he wasn't part of the clique. Other students were seriously affected too because many students dreamed of becoming professors, and being among the top students was one of the pathways toward that career. Our grading system was 60% written exams and 40% practical work like presentations, assignments, midterms, etc. The problem was that the clique controlled teachers could give you such terrible marks in that 40% portion that doing well in the written exams didn't matter much. The clique was so entitled that they genuinely acted as if they owned the entire department. They would harass or bully students, and if someone didn't act as they wanted, they could get one of their teachers to, target, scold or intimidate them with other issues.

I was involved with the student opposition party during my first two years, so they also deliberately dragged down my grades. Eventually, I quit all student political activities for my own safety as the ruling party and this clique were becoming an autocratic force that I couldn't deal alone. Unfortunately, leaving politics didn't help much because the damage to my first two years' results couldn't really be reversed through supplementary exams. Even if I retook the written exam, the practical marks stayed the same. So, basically, I was screwed.

Now this story has a bit of happy ending. After we graduated, two of our batchmates who were part of the teachers clique became lecturers themselves, through bribes and the political connections of the Big Loser. One of this batchmate (let's call him Creepy looser) had been creepy toward girls since our university days. We used to joke that there wasn't a female student, senior or junior, that he hadn't tried to get into a relationship with. Once he became a teacher, however, it stopped being just creepy and became an abuse of power. He started approaching female students and using grades and thesis supervision as leverage to pressure them. Eventually, a brave female student filed a complaint with the department head because her final thesis (required for completing her bachelor's degree) was allegedly being rejected because she refused his inappropriate advances. Now guess who the department head was at that time? The Big Looser! By then, he had become an associate professor.

Instead of properly investigating the complaint, Big Loser tried to make the whole thing disappear. He sweet talked the student, sympathized with her and offered to personally accept her thesis if she agreed not to pursue the complaint further. She didn't back down though. One day, she secretly recorded her conversation with Big Loser in his office and shared the recording in our university groups. She then formally complained against both Big Loser and Creepy Loser. After that, lots of other female students also came forward and shared their chat and messenger screenshot of inappropriate advances by the Creepy Loser. Apparently, he had tried his luck with numerous female students, both from our department and from other departments across the university. Also I should mention that the creepy Loser was already married with a child when all of this was happening.

The story blew up and became national news in my country. Students started protesting, and eventually the university permanently dismissed Creepy Loser and temporarily suspended Big Loser. Then came another plot twist. After some time, the ruling political party lost power and the opposition came into government. Big Loser's political protection disappeared. As far as I know, he is still out of a job and has no way of returning to our university. Don't know where the creepy looser is. He disappeared from the radar. All the other people from their clique is still alright though. Hopefully, karma catches up with them someday too.

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I’ve already booked my flights to the Maldives, but I haven’t booked accommodation or planned my activities yet.

We’re thinking of staying in Maafushi to keep the trip affordable. We may also do a day trip to a resort for the experience.

For those who have visited the Maldives, I’d really appreciate your advice:

1. Where should we stay in Maafushi if we want a good balance between price, location, cleanliness, and overall experience?
2. Which activities are genuinely worth doing and which ones can we skip?
3. Is a resort day trip worth the money, and are there any resorts you would recommend?
4. Are there any things we should avoid, especially tourist traps, overpriced activities, or unnecessary expenses?
5. Any other tips for saving money without missing the best parts of the Maldives?

We’re mainly looking for a good experience on a reasonable budget rather than a luxury trip.

Thanks in advance for any recommendations.