64 years - 1 day

King Solomon writes that there is a time to be born and a time to die, a time to weep and a time to rejoice. The joy that comes with a baby being born is met with grief when the lifetime expires. Dad’s funeral day was on his birthday, seven years ago.

In order to revisit his life, I thought through some of the titles which can be given to him ranging from being a father, son, husband, believer, engineer, Tamilian but none could come close to his work as an evangelist. In one of the incidents, during the printing of the wedding invitation card for my brother, Dad was negotiating on adding some more bible verses to the invitation. I used to think if Dad had thought of the wedding invitation to be a gospel tract. On the day of the wedding, in the bride’s hometown he was distributing some biblical literature to the people who were coming for the wedding. He was met with mockery from the relatives who felt it was not a proper occasion to be doing this. Back home in Chennai the wedding reception hosted by us did not go well in terms of the program on stage but Dad made sure that biblical literature was distributed to the people present. There was not a single occasion happy or sad that he missed out on sharing about Jesus or distributing gospel tracts. 

He was not doing to get some reward from man since he is the one who gives away money and never gets any money. He wasn’t a member of any organised church, so there was no influence from there. There was something else inside of him.

There were lots of sacrifice in terms of giving up food, clothing and choosing simple travel. A friend of his reminded me a couple of days back how a cup of coffee given to him in the morning would generally turn up cold and eventually get spoilt by the evening time, since he would mostly skip or forget it during a time of fast.

How harsh he was on hypocrite ministers in the church and the inroads made by prosperity doctrine. The allurments of a car, wealth or money doesn’t belong to the pulpit but Jesus warned people who were rich. Of course, there were some church leaders and members who weren’t happy and waited for an opportunity to accuse him falsely but he wasn’t disturbed a bit. People thought he was jealous of their success but he dint consider riches or living in a foreign country as being successful. 

During his visit to meet me in Netherlands post my accident, he happened to see the autobiography of Ravi Zacharius “Walking from east to west” in my room and mentioned to my mom that he dint want me to read that book. I was furious thinking dad was jealous since I trusted Ravi and his humility but the unfolding of the sexual allegations on Ravi last year and to read about Ravi’s double life were completely disturbing . I felt I needed to apologise to my dad that that he was right but it was too late.

The more I come across people who speak sweet words on the outside but have a revenge filled attitude on the inside, I learnt to appreciate Dad’s gentle character on the inside even though he was harsh with words on the outside. He did not look neat with the style of clothes he used to wear or the bag he carried. I always wondered why he always made friends with the less fortunate and helped them, many of whom couldn’t do anything back in return at all. Last month, I met a gentleman in the neighbouring slum colony cluster Kannagi nagar who reminded me of his help to the less fortunate.

I took over his mobile phone number and started using his number the day he died, and was in awe of the transparent life that he lived. There was a mobile number which was saved as xxx on his phone and I was curious for a long time as to whom it was referring. Then one fine day I got a call from the same mobile number and it was a known friend of his who got help for many years. The help to him stopped the day when Dad learnt that he re-married someone else while still being married to his wife. Dad was so rigid in his principles that he did not encourage any kind of moral misbehaviour especially with people who were into ministry and I remember the gentleman asking for Dad’s forgiveness few weeks before Dad passed away. 

I finished my earlier tribute to him with the words  “He lived unknown and died unknown…”, at least the latter part is true because I got a call from an old neighbour, a couple of months back who was surprised that he passed away 7 years ago as she dint know about it at all.

There was lots of sweat involved in his travels because he travelled on foot and on public transport also because he could meet people and could use the money for helping others. 

“Dad travelled by foot and used public transport but I am a bit advanced as I travel mostly in my bicycle”, I remarked to mom yesterday after coming back from a 50 kilometer bicycle trip to mint street, a wholesale shopping complex selling jute textiles.

“Dad was much better and focussed in his duties and not careless, unlike you” replied my mom. She referred to my unwise long cycling decision on the streets of Chennai

I asked for a double portion of anointing in prayer and what followed after that was the start of the weekly fellowship every Sunday for the migrant labourers and the bag making unit at Kannagi nagar where some physically challenged women are employed.

The bruises and hurts are so important as one finishes life because it speaks volumes of the risk one had taken during the life span to be the hands and feet of Christ and not simply sitting at the gallery to watch the others compete. 

There was disappointment when death was nearing, as we prayed for life extension. 

"Did God forsake at the point of death ?" No Death is not the end.

I used to think that the number of days living in this earth is important but have come to the realisation that it is more important to complete this life’s race clean washed by His blood whether it be short or long. 

Better to live short and be called home to heaven.

“Refiner’s fire - My heart’s one desire is t be holy - set apart for you. So take my life and let it be consecrated Lord to Thee”

11 years

17 June 2010 - It’s still by far the best day of my life. Generally, an incident such as a major accident isn’t considered to be a memorable day but a day to be burnt from the memory and forgotten. However the struggle to normalcy post that incident is so beautiful and a miracle that can be unravelled only when the suffering is embraced and not shut down. 

In the movie “The passion” of Christ, Mel Gibson portrays Jesus as embracing the cross when it was given to him. Someone then watching him surprisingly asks him not to do so because it is the very cross, he is going to die on. Even though this narrative of embracing the cross is not there in the Bible gospels, it depicts Jesus correctly as someone who had a secret ambition of embracing suffering through the cross he could die for the "sins" of the world. The cross was and is considered to be a symbol of shame. There are those who mock the cross of how God could be helplessly dying on a cross when he had the power to escape from it. The answer is because human suffering is real and everyone goes though pain and suffering. Jesus taught and then lived it out when he asked for those who are suffering innocentlly for no fault of theirs to embrace the pain and suffering that comes along with it. The death and resurrection goes hand in hand, so Jesus rose again bodily on the third day proving that death is not the end and there is justice.

As I am writing, there is a noise of animals screaming with two stray dogs chasing my neighbour’s rooster, and even as I go to my balcony and scream to shoo the dogs away, the rooster is now a meal for the dogs. The neighbour runs towards the dogs with a stone in his hand but the dogs are quick to take their prey towards the bushes. The dogs had planned it well and cornered the rooster until it had no place to jump and escape.  Observing this incident from the surface, something which belonged to my neighbour is gone. The neighbour's children loved the rooster and we also at times listened to the rooster's crow. There is disappointment and it gets compounded when it’s a corona time when there is already limited resources and limited opportunities available outside. 

Suffering strikes people many times when they are not prepared for it and it is not possible to live life expecting the worst to happen. However when suffering strikes, every one reacts differently. The pure character of a person comes out during suffering which is inherently raw - sometimes it can be converting the suffering into a healing balm for someone else or sometimes it happens that people look forward to hurting others causing a suffering chain. Many times people tend to do the latter.

One of the general advises from family and friends is not to talk about the past or the accident in particular. The goal of this advise is to prevent a negative image from being perceived in the minds of the people. Culturally I understand that people exaggerate credentials, their job and their family status to prevent being treated badly by another individual. There is some kind of boasting competition that takes place. This is sad because it stops people from being genuine and most often makes one hesitant to ask for help. The more I spoke on this topic, I understood that people wanted you to clearly and without doubt prove to them that you are without a doubt not handicapped at all. Even though I could prove them easily, this idea conflicted heavily with my values and my perspective on life. It simply states two things on the surface - one is that you are accepted and held in a higher regard only when you are not physically challenged and the second one is that it is discriminatory to the physically challenged themselves who are not in the picture, who many times suffer for no fault of theirs. The more uncomfortable I was with their thinking, it made me to evade answering the questions which made people assume that I am hiding something significant. The main problem however was that the particular way of thinking was not acceptable to me. Since I had been in a wheelchair for some months, it made me think that you would not be accepted had you remained in there permanently. On the other hand, no one should have the victim perspective or have an inferiority complex at all but rather be filled with compassion.

Manivannan used to work as a senior manager with Tata Consultancy Services, an IT firm in Chennai. One evening in the year 2015, I got a call from him because we were supposed to go to a conference together, the very next day. Since we didn’t know each other before, we introduced ourselves and decided at what time and which place we would meet up. Since I had the car, I had offered to pick him up and some of his colleagues . Even though he requested me to pick him from his home, we decided that all of us would meet at the nearby bus stop. Generally I pick up people from their homes even though they don’t live on the way towards the destination. However for some months I had been through a phase of mourning, and there was a thought in me that I had suffered immensely above anyone else so it wasn’t worth going out of the way to help others. This prevented me from even asking how the others would get to the bus stop.

On that particular Saturday morning as I went nearer to the bus stop, I could see Manivannan annan (as I respectfully call him), sitting in the busstop. I then tried to open the passenger door, expecting him to walk normally, when I saw him help himself with his bare hands from the seat to the pavement which was more than a feet high and then slowly help himself into the car. I was speechless for most of the journey as he told me how he came from his home to the busstop. He had to hitch a ride to the main road while his wife walked for about 3/4 of a kilometer to come to the highway where he could help him hold his hands and cross the road. That day I decided that we be friends and we have come so far that I asked him to be my mentor in life. He was a senior manager having travelled to several countries, he remained simple. Manivannan annan never spoke abut his disabilities and for once I thought I can be friends since he has suffered several times more than me quietly and positively. We continue to work together and help others as much as possible, and I consider it a privilege and a blessing to be close to him.