Tuesday, April 6, 2010

An unforgettable miracle

It was the end of a busy and tiring day at college. Rather hot too, as Chennai was slowly getting into its scorching summer heat. Besides, it was a festive day in some of the Tamil Brahmin houses, called the Karadayan Nonbu or the Saavithri Viratham, the day when women, particularly married ones pray for the well-being and long life of their dear hubbies. Girls, especially little ones get to eat some nice goodies made at home using rice, jaggery, coconut and lots of ghee. What more? Don’t you need to go to school/ college or office next day and flaunt something that will identify that you have celebrated the festival? So, there is also a thin but sacred and powerful yellow thread tied around the neck after the pooja. (Hehe… Now I wonder how many are going to chase me for saying that. Nevertheless, it is a very auspicious occasion with its sanctity and I dare say no more.)

Well, yeah. So I got over with my college for the day and came back home and had to rush to go to my GRE classes, which I was attending in Mylapore, about 8-9 kms from Thiruvanmiyur, where I used to live. People at home told me to get back home soon that day as I had to come back in time for the festival. Though I didn’t want to miss the fun of making those yummy goodies and preparing for the festival, I was not ok with the idea of missing DEJ sir’s class (Donald E. James, taught us verbal in our GRE class and I don’t generally like to miss his classes which are too good and engrossing). So, off I went for the class like I go any other day. And never once did I even dream about what I was going to face that particular day.

Mylapore, as any Chennaiite will know is the hot spot when it comes to religious occasions and for Brahmins, the place is a must-visit-at least-once. With the famous Kapaleeswarar temple’s silhouette in the dusk, with the four side streets of the temple tank abuzz with activity and the pretty women folk with nicely braided and beflowered heads chattering away in Tamil, the very air is fragrant and vibrant. You really can’t help stopping by and appreciating the energy there.

So it was quite natural that I got into the festive mood when I was returning back from class and I stopped my Scooty to call up people at home and ask them if I had to get some Mylapore special things for the pooja. I was just told to get some fruits and flowers.

Now before I proceed, you need to get introduced to this little talisman of mine. It was a denim wallet gifted to me by my brother, which had a small pouch to hold my cell phone as well. But at that exact moment, the cell phone was not in its compartment. Obviously because I was on a call and more importantly, the wallet itself was not with its owner – that’s me.

I had got down from my Scooty to haggle a little with the nearby fruit vendor for bananas and being very pleased with myself for the deal I struck with her, I was about to get the money out of the wallet and EUREKA!!! The wallet is gone. I started searching frantically in the vehicle, trying to remember the things one usually tries to remember. “Where did I use it last?” I had taken out my phone to call home from the wallet. And that is the last I saw of it.

Seconds were ticking and it was already getting late for me to go home. Luckily I had the phone with me. My eyes welled with tears already. Not because I had much money in it – it had just a hundred and five bucks to my knowledge. That’s TO MY KNOWLEDGE. (I will tell you something more shocking later) But the wallet itself was very dear to me.

I just rode all the way back home and once I had parked the vehicle and went inside, my mom and granny came running to tell me to buck up and get ready for the pooja. But there I was, hopelessly standing and recounting to them what had happened. They were just trying to console me and tell me it happens and it was ok. The usual, very true and slightly irksome dialogue came up. “It is ok. It could have been worse.”
But my mind was just refusing to shut it off. All through the ride back home, the only thought that kept me going was that, it belonged to ME and it will and has to find its way back to me somehow. So when all the drama was unfolding, the Nonbu was quite forgotten and those hot goodies just lay there, waiting to be offered to God. Just then, the phone rang tringgggggggggg……

Now, let’s rewind back to one day in my college lab, where I had done my experiments and got my friend Sharmi’s phone number scrawled in a bit of paper for some trivial reason. That little piece of paper with her number lay there in my wallet. Didn’t I say earlier that everything happens with a reason? Now this little bit of paper will explain it.

Coming to the present, back in the market, when I had taken my phone out of the wallet, I had dropped the wallet absently and I didn’t notice it falling down under my vehicle. A guy who had been standing near the bike had taken the wallet and before he realized what was going on, I was gone from there. So, he had like anyone else, opened the wallet to see its contents and found its little money. And the many little photos I had, along with my tattered driving license copy. And he also found two things which were of the most significance. One was this little bit of paper with the number in it and and…

(The shocking thing I was going to tell) Six crisp hundred rupees notes in an interior part of the wallet – which even I didn’t know existed in it. So, this good hearted guy immediately tried calling that number from the chit and asked for a Lakshmi. Sharmi, recognizing who it was meant to be, dutifully gave him my number and that explains why my phone went tringggggg…

I was overjoyed that my wallet was found. But this finder of my purse, (let’s call him Serendipity for now), asked me a hundred questions to make sure it indeed belonged to me. I recounted every single thing I knew of in the wallet. But the six 100 rupees notes – I couldn’t explain it. I suddenly realized in a flash, how it came into my wallet and that is quite irrelevant here. So, finally Serendipity got convinced that it was mine and decided I can get it back with all its contents if I go there. But my people were not going to allow me at that time.

I had to wait for another 24 hours before I could lay my hands on it. My neighbor uncle, who was kind enough to not let me go alone, accompanied me and helped me get it back from Serendipity. Serendipity was rewarded with extra hundred bucks (He had already taken a hundred for the phone call he had made.) for his deed and I was back home fully euphoric and relieved. I felt a very strong sense of gratitude – for Sharmi, for the neighbor uncle, for that bit of paper and most of all to Serendipity and that magical moment of candor, which urged him to make the call to make the wallet reach its owner. After all, it wouldn’t have taken him long to just pocket the money from there and throw off the wallet.

The rest is history – as in, the lectures I had to hear about the importance of being responsible, careful and very importantly aware of what is happening around you. But what mattered to me the most was – Serendipity. They literally call it chance-findings and in this case, what I found was something invaluable – goodwill of everything around me that made this happen. It was quite a miracle to me.
Every year, during this festival, I thank God – for all the miracles he plays around us every day, which we are too busy to notice.

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