Mr Goodbar

I rushed out of my flat without saying bye to my half sleeping roomie on 07:45 am, September 1st.Two minutes later she called me up and asked in the most incredulous voice- “You already left????” (Well I can’t blame her because everyone knows that even if I’m an hour late for office, no one will catch me rushing out and that to on a Saturday morning ) Well that day I was heading off to the pickup point for the cab that’ll take me to one of the schools in rural district of Nalambakkam Chennai where Team Everest was conducting learning Audit. So I can’t help but be excited about it I just love being with kids!)

We conducted many competitions and conducted a few classes after the audit. When we were distributing the prizes, one of the girls, Jeevitha, whom i was teaching arithmetic, came up to me and asked “How come I didn’t get any prize?” it almost broke my heart when I saw the forlorn look on her face and I went through my bag in search for something to give her. That’s when in my mind, an image flashed of someone else rampaging through his bag to give me a chocolate. That very chocolate I now gave to Jeevitha whose face burst into rapture.

Now who was that someone else?
That morning I waved my hand at a passing share auto and got in. Then some few minutes into the ride a very aged man got it. Around 80 years with a very feeble voice he asked me -”Are you a school teacher?”( Ok that made me do a mental counting of all the imaginary grey and white hair again!!!)

Me: “No uncle” (laughing)
Uncle: “what do you do?”
Me: “I work in a software company.”
Uncle: “Oh, so you have office on Saturdays too?”
Me:”No no today I’m volunteering in a school.”
Uncle:”So I guessed right!” (That is when I saw his almost toothless grin  )
Me: “But I’m not a teacher!”
Uncle:”But since you are going to a school and you aren’t a student that makes you a teacher!” (he was chuckling and even I couldn’t suppress my smile. He had a very good point! )

So for the next 5 minutes he was asking about Team Everest. I just hope I did justice to explaining the various initiatives of Team Everest (Please do forgive if I made a slip here or there :$ ) Then rampaging through his bag he took out a chocolate and patting my back he gave it to me 

So just as I was getting down from the auto shaking my hand he said- “I am so happy that the younger generation is doing so much for others. Keep up the good work!”

I almost felt like I’ve received a Nobel Prize or something. Though I treat my chocolates like “My precious” (Gollum style of Lord of the Rings), I was even more happy to see the joy when Jeevitha was happily licking her fingers.