TSB 8 Of "Kylo" and "The Hindu newspaper"

Previous Post in the series TSB 7 Booth Tales

Soon after the Booth closed down, It was back to the same old routine. Its interesting to see that help comes from people you least expect, and you meet so many interesting characters when we bother to open our eyes and see things apart from whats obvious.You realize that we've missed out on a large part of life because of our infatuation with "our" world. Which is like looking into a mirror all the time, and forgetting the part thats not visible in the mirror.


I wouldnt blame anyone in particular. Blinded by this incessant need to be comfortable with immediate surroundings, I had become the same, until things changed after meeting Murali and the whole fiasco. I felt like a fugitive on the run, and in the process had made interesting accquaintances. One of these meetings got me a job with "The Hindu". It had to do with collecting information on the distribution services of the local agents and selling their publications. It was interesting to me, because it meant that I could start life all over again, and two, meant some decent money on the side.

At the same time, I also got the opportunity to work in the evening promoting a new brand of soap called "Kylo" which in my mother tongue Konkani meant CROW. Fancy selling a soap brand called CROW.

Since I was doing both together, it meant a lot of new faces and less time to despair.

There was this one interesting cople I met on one of my morning rounds, with the newspaper business, who seemed to be hackled all the time. The wifey would scream at me in the morning and ask me to come in the evening, and the husband would yell at me in the evening and ask me to come in the morning. This went on for a couple of days, when I decided maybe they weren't the type that would read "The Hindu " anyway. Important lesson learnt. In the same building, I met a college mate of mine, who was pursuing her B.Com degree, as opposed to my BBM. Interestingly, though we never met formally, it was strange how warm she was that day, and how I didn't feel embarassed at all, knocking on someone's door. Lesson learnt again.

Then there was this Doctor couple who'm I had met in the morning, and then in the evening again while I was in the soap business. They were so happy to see me doing this, they bought my whole day's soap target (like 24 bars!!!) just like that. Kindness did exist. And there was this "terror"/"mean"/"villain" lecturer of our college who had come to the shop where I was promoting the soap, and he smiled. He never bought any soap, nor did I ask him to, but when I went back to college some time back, he told me, "I know you will do well." That meant a lot to me.

The Alwyn bakery in the town was the best.  My parents used to exhange Foreign currency whenever they came down from the gulf at his shop, and I used to remember buying the stuff for my hostel when I came shopping with my mum before the schools reopened. As a kid I never thought that I'd work there in some point in life. It so happened that I used to do the soap promotion at his shop and one day I accidentally knocked on his door in the morning as part of my newspaper business. I din't know it was his house, and  he was surprised. Today too I try to visit, and we talk about old days, and of different things. I buy stuff from him, and he asks for my opinion on different things.

Surprising, how you meet the same people at different points in life, in different circumstances. Its like a see-saw, sometimes your up and sometimes your down. How you treat someone when your up and they are down, shows the strength of your character. 

 One of the important lessons I learnt in this phase was that, you can learn from anything and anyone. Nothing is going to last forever, and the quicker you understand that, the better placed you'll be for change. Humility is the garnish in a mans character. And character is what its all about.

Madan

Pre Reads in the series
The Story Book 1
The Story Book 2