Context is All

The Art of Kindness

I have this envelope on my altar, inside is a letter I received so many years ago now that I can’t remember where it sits in the Gregorian calendar.

But I know where it sits in my heart.

I remember the day I received this letter so painstakingly written and detailed from a lone chai shop along a path beside the river Ganga in the riverside holy resort of Rishikesh.

It had been sent to my brother's house in Rotorua, Aotearoa which was pretty much my only mail address during my days of troubadour-ring around India and other countries who would have me. 

This was in the days before the Internet and email and in the heady days of the magic of mail. It never ceased to delight me that a small piece of paper could make its way across the big wide world, being passed from hand to hand, being stashed into bags and onto planes or ships and somehow as if by magic arriving into my hot little hands.

Anyway, back then we kept in contact with people met On The Road with actual handwritten letters and the sharing of addresses was as commonplace as Poste Restante and other old fashioned miracles of the art of communication.

I had met this fellow on a steamy hot monsoon swoony day as I walked along the path beside the Goddess Ganga River. The same river who swallowed the ashes of my husband in a swirl and gurgle and then sashayed on like a rock star without a backward glance.

I was hot and tired and bothered and possibly feeling sorry for myself. On every count I presented a picture of opportunity. I was THERE, I was WHITE, I looked uncomfortable and I was ALONE.

I mean BINGO! It’s for this very reason that I never ventured out when under the influence of Bhang Lassi, the all seeing eye of India can spot a wasted tourist and have hatched a hundred ways to exploit that before you have even crossed the road.

This day, I was just hot and sweaty and my hair was going boof so I still had some semblance of my wits about me. This guy spotted me nevertheless and called me over for chai and a bit of a sit down. 

As we drank chai together he detailed his medical condition and problems with all the precision of a pensioner on a plethora of pills and prescriptions. He needed an operation that he could not afford to pay for and thought I might like to contribute to his Operation Fund.

Not an unusual story so far right? In Asia there is a saying (amongst firangi living or roaming around there)  that you are one family drama away from losing a friendship with a local. In other words firangi get tired of being seen as a walking ATM machine and whine on about it quite a bit.

And on. And on.

It gets a bit tiresome to be frank, it’s not as if these people don’t ask their own country men for help but firang seem to take great offense at being asked for help and suspect every encounter with a local to end up in being ripped off, robbed or (and this is by far the worst thing) being taken for a fool!

But here’s the thing. We are there right? In their country. Seemingly carefree, rich, white and privileged.

It’s kinda asking for it isn’t it? Being rich and white and THERE in a country whose poverty is often a direct result of the wealth of the West?

It’s not like you cant just say “bro, sorry but no.” Or “bro, here take ten rupees,”  is it?
Then we get to carry on with our day.

No harm done, is it?

Which is pretty much what happened that day in Rishikesh.

The guy told me his convoluted story about the operation he needed, showed me the documents and so on.

There wasn’t a lot I could do about it but pay for his chai and give him ten rupees and carry on with my day. 

When he asked for my address, I gave it with absolute confidence that there was no risk he would turn up at my door.

But he did! 

In the form of this letter, the photo, the prescription ……

I opened it and fell to the floor laughing my vagina off.

Through gasps I managed to share the story with my brother, I mean what the actual fuck I said. Soon these buggas will be having ATM machines! This guy didn’t wait around for the West to invent GoFundMe, did he? Talk about resourceful.

It was like a beggar had reached out and with the power and magic of the gods had opened a portal from my brothers table to that chai stall in Rishikesh!

My bro had a totally different reaction, his blood pressure hit the fan on the ceiling (which I turned on in case he totally overheated himself).

He lost it and abused that poor guy from arsehole to breakfast! Now this brother was such a soft-hearted guy and as kind as could be, to see him explode like that sobered my laughter for a bit.

We talked about it after he had calmed down and agreed that it hardly mattered at all whether the story was true of not, and that there was no risk to either of us of this story going any further. But still he reckoned he felt kind of violated. 

To be asked for help? I asked or To be taken for a fool?

He agreed it was the latter.

His reaction wasn’t unusual. Everyone I told the story too also reacted strongly, no one seemed to applaud this guy for his industry. I mean, if life had handed him a different set of circumstances he could be heading a very bloody successful business.

Except of course there was quite a large chance that this story WAS his business.

And if that’s the case, I still think bloody good on him.

We get ripped off by corporations, supermarkets, governments in all kinds of faceless ways every single day of our lives and we don’t have a fit about that do we? we accept it with all the lethargy of a bloody slave and then whine on about that.

If someone is going to face me up and ask for money, first of all if I see they need it and I can help - I WILL give what I can and if I see that they are grifters, I simply see the grift. I keep my blood pressure where it usually is and flow on.

I remember watching a couple in Kathmandu trying to enjoy their evening meal while a beggar stood with the most soulful accusatory stare right beside their uncomfortable selves. They tried to ignore him and looked like they were going to choke on their lasagna, he persisted. They looked for a waiter to come and deal with it, the waiter had his soft eyes on the beggar. They made shooing movements with their lasagna laden forks, still he persisted looking like he might just drop dead at their feet at any moment.

They had obviously read an early Lonely Plonkers guide book that advised people NOT to give to beggars, but to donate to a (usually corrupt) charity instead. So they persisted in refusing to acknowledge this man only inches from their dinner plates.

Eventually one of them gathered courage and announced loudly and very clearly, not quite looking at the beggar but in his vicinity.

“NO THANK YOU” she said.

I waited to hear her add that she had given at the office but she didn’t they struggled on with their meal.

I wondered what she was thanking him for.

I wondered if she realised that what he was selling her simply was his absence. For ten rupees he would have wandered away and come to my table where I was enjoying my meal and show uninterrupted.

It’s all about context, isn’t it?
Sometimes we just have to get out of the way of our own insecurities (ego).

Pretty sure they left that restaurant with a bigger dose of constipation than they arrived with.

For some strange reason this letter has managed to stick to me through too many life changes, boxes in storage and more. When I found it as I unpacked myself into this flat, I laughed again and put it on my altar where all the gods of grace will  bless that fulla for his industry and commitment to the process of human kindness.

And as a small reminder to myself that kindness will trump ego every time.

.