Divine Grace 4: A Chance Meeting Proves to be a Divine Design! - 2

                     'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
                               Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays:
                               Hither and thither moves, and mates,  ..............
                               .......................................................................  
                                        --Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam:  
                                          Fitzgerald  Translation

When one leaves home and familiar surroundings and goes to another city, state or country in search of job or education, one goes through an initial period of depression.  Anybody who went away from home would have gone through this.   The same is true of the young bride starting her married life with her husband's family.  I remember actually praying to God that I be not selected for admission to post-graduate course (Soil Mechanics) in IIT-Khraghpur.  I had travelled one day and two nights by train from Madras to Kharaghpur, bag and baggage, in response to a telegram from IIT.  But it was so threatening and disappointing that I wished I do not get selected - and it happened!  I returned by the next train and surprised my father.  I did not have enough  sense or mental maturity to understand the financial strain I put on him by this wasted train trip!

That happened in 1960.  Now fast forward to 1990.  

These were times when it was rare to see people from India come to the US with a visa and a job - either on contract or through the parent company in India.  Most of us came here for higher studies with the condition that we return home.  Invariably, we end up finding a job here (and losing the job back home if there was one!) and get settled here. 

I know many  cases of people returning back within days of arriving - especially if they had the financial backing and family support.  Here is one such case where this young man had just come leaving his mother, young wife and a baby girl in India.  He was so upset with what he saw against what he had in his mind that he was ready to return the third day of his arrival.

My daughter was doing her undergraduate studies at the University of Texas at Austin.  She and some of her friends whose parents were like us - first generation immigrants from India - set up a voluntary group to help new arrivals of students from India.  They put together a welcome pacckage and sent it to prospective students from India.  It was so thorough and professional that many later told me that they really thought that the welcome package was sent by the University staff!

Venkatesh of Coimbatore - a total stranger to us - came to Austin as a student of the Business School.  At that time he was working in India, married and had a little baby girl.  He had to leave them and his mother in Coimbatore.

Upon arrival at Austin airport, to his dismay, he found that the friend of his who was expected to receive him at the airport and help him was not there.  He was not available over the phone either.  Venkatesh had the letter sent by our daughter's volunatry setup and called the phone number listed on it.  It was our home phone number.  It was late night.  My daughter went to the airport to pick him up and brought him to our home.  I was already asleep after the days strenuous work and was woke up by the loud phone talk of Venkatesh to somebody from our phone.

Next morning I took him out to help find an apartment and also to set up a bank account.

On the third day I got a call from him.

"Sir, I want to have your advice.  May I come to your house and talk with you?"

I said OK and went to his place and brought him to my home.

"What is the matter?"

"Sir, I am very disappointed.  I am seriously thinking of returning home"

"Are you sure?  Do you realize the consequences?  You have borrowed heavily to pay for your flight out from India.  Now, if you want to return that is again a big expenditure."

"Sir, I have thought about all that.  It is a big task to pay off the loan.  However, I have some savings and I can continue to save and pay off the loan.  I will be able to start work in the same company."

"Venkatesh!  What is the need to return now?  You have just come.  You wait through one semester and see how it goes and then you can decide."

"Apart from the living conditions, the curriculum also is not as I thought.  I feel I will be wasting my time here."

"See, you have just arrived.  The strain of long air travel, added to the fact that you are missing your mother, wife and child is making you mentally and physically fatigued. Any decision you make now is not going to be proper.  I would say you just wait for a semester.  If you come back to me and tell me you are returning when you are in a happy frame of mind, then I would agree."

He seemed to be convinced and I took him back to his apartment.

He telephoned me after the semester to thank me and to say how he is happy now to have talked with me instead of going ahead with his decision to return home immediately.  Shortly afterwards he brought his mother, wife and child to Austin.  He even took active interest in the newly formed Ausitn Tamil Sangam activities.

He completed his studies and has since been working as a Professor in a University in Pennsylvania.

He perhaps would have done well back in Coimbatore had he returned soon after reaching here, without completing his studies.  But the financial strain and the reaction of others about his returning would have definitely had a big negative impact.  

I cannot help feeling that it was Divine design to have caused us to meeting each other leading to his staying here and seeing it through to finish his studies as planned.