Inconvenienced, When Convenient !

Ever since Appa had his cerebral haemorrhage in 2008, I have been saying that we get challenges, troubles, inconveniences only when it is convenient for us to deal with them. Let me take Appa’s passing away…

Amma and Appa were to come over to Delhi on Aug 6, 2008. On Aug 4th I called Appa at around 9.30 am to decide on the snacks they were going to bring to Delhi. Krishnan was working out of Bangalore and I had been there for the weekend as I regularly did then. Around 11 am I got a call from my cousin Koka saying Appa had a fall and he is at the hospital. Over the next few calls it was clear that this was something serious. Kabir dropped me at the airport and Krishnan left for Hyderabad from Bangalore.

Over the next four months Appa regained consciousness but didn’t recognise any of us nor knew what was happening around him. We moved him in an Ambulance from Apollo Hyderabad to Manipal, Bangalore. On Dec 12th, he passed away. A void that can never be filled. But, Krishnan and I are happy that we were able to get him the best medical facility available at that time.

I shudder to think if the same accident had happened just 5 years before in 2003. We were just getting out of our bankruptcy and were in the process of building our resources. We could not have afforded the quality of care that we could in 2008.

This got me thinking … we are inconvenienced when it is convenient.

Chennai Floods

We were staying in Chennai when the devastating floods happened in 2015. The first floor was unoccupied and we got help in the middle of the night when the water level started to rise. We managed to take provisions, a gas cylinder and the stove up to the first floor besides all our clothes. Not just that, for a whole day on Dec 2nd, we could provide tea and some biscuits to nearly 40 people who came up to our floor to escape the floods !!

What if we were living in a one storey house ? Where would we have gone ? And because we had done four road trips before that one, we had all things in a “travel ready” mode. We had milk powder rather than milk pouches, we had suitcases and storage boxes ready. Also the overhead water tank was full, and we had enough water till the floods receded.

Sure we had losses too. The Yeti was gone because water had risen beyond the dashboard. But again, we were safe and we could help a few people. Once again, we were inconvenienced when it was convenient for us to deal with it.

Volvo Breaks Down on NH8

Cut to yesterday 😁. We had gone to Tostem India‘s office at Manesar to finalise the window type that we wanted in the Kitchen and Amma’s bedroom. The windows that we have currently are 19 years old and rain water has started to seep in :(. Dosas Under a Deluge.

As we neared the Tostem office an alarm went off saying the Power system needed urgent service. We called Rakesh at Kashyap Motors to ask what we should do. He asked us to drive for some more time as the car had been parked for a long time and the battery might have given out. We parked the car at the Tostem office, did our discussions and left around 2 pm.

It was 49 deg C…

Since none of the alerts were sounding, we left Tostem’s office and started back home. We had driven for about 5 kilometres when the message flashed again. I called up Rakesh again and he said, just drive slowly and see if you can reach home. By the time I drove past the Hero Honda chowk flyover, the car was not picking up speed and then the message that the brake system has failed came up. We just parked the car a kilometre from Hero Honda chowk on NH8 and informed Rakesh.

We had mentioned this issue with the car to Sandeep and Navdeep at Tostem during our discussion. Navdeep offered to send his car and driver to follow us, but we had refused. We now called him to see if he could send his car. The heat was unbearable and we had at least an hour to wait till Subba came over to collect the car. We were standing under the shade of a direction board 😁.

Navdeep not only sent us the car, but he also sent out two young men on a bike with water etc ! How very thoughtful. We had our water flasks, courtesy all the travelling that we do, but it was a really welcome gesture.

We finally managed to pick up Subba from Sector 30 where he had come to drop off a vehicle. Again a fortuitous coincidence. We handed over the car to Subba and Navdeep’s driver dropped us off home by 4 pm.

We learnt later, the car had to be taken to the service station using a crane as it had stopped again after a short distance.

What’s convenient about this incident ? Well, it happened at a time when Navdeep was able to help and Subba was already on his way to Gurgaon. What if it had happened somewhere on a highway in Madhya Pradesh ? It would have taken much longer to get help and we would have had all the luggage with us !!

Yesterday’s incident once again reinforces the fact that all of us are inconvenienced when it is convenient for us to deal with the problem. Have the faith and trust in your favourite God. Life has inconveniences and troubles, but also solutions. Hang in there and wait for help to arrive… it always does.

Jai Jagannath …since this is the Rath Yatra time 🙏🏾🙏🏾🙏🏾.