How Somu found me

 

Hair raising thrill is obvious when something sweet by chance happens. It happened to me nearly two months ago.  Cutting down our evening walk at the nearby ground we had parked our car on Devaparthiva Road where we lived for decades as the road perpendicular to it was under repair.  We had to visit a shop close by on that road.  We had got down from the car.  On seeing us, our friend stopped his scooter with a pillion rider.  The pillion rider [he was to soon reveal that he was the rider's elder brother] dismounting the scooter asked for the house of  one Subba Rao.   "Subba Rao!" ....my late grandfather.  I was happy someone known for  years to our family was in search of the house which was no longer with us. Ownership and house had since been changed and we had moved to another ancestral house.   I told him "I am Subba Rao's grandson".  To make him believe his ears I repeated!    His face lit up in utter happiness.  When he told me that long ago he was coming to our house for weekly evening meal, I immediately recognized him as 'Somu' as he was called by us then.  He must have been around 20 by the year 1962 when he was coming.   In the dining hall, after my grandfather returned from his office, dinner plates used to be arranged for the eight of us in the family plus one Butea leaf plate for Somu near the door.   I insisted to sit next to him [his left] for the meal and I have very vivid memory of this as a four year old.  He remembered my name too as clearly as me.  It was a most joyful moment for him meeting me and that too in that fashion.  Somu must be around 80 now.  He also recalled the other relatives' houses he went for the meal on other days of the week and mentioned he was trying to meet their families also.  Those were economically difficult years for his family, living in nearby towns where there were no colleges and they used to be sent to Mysore for studying further so that they can get a job later.  Mysore was and is a popular hub for higher education. 

The system of offering meals esp. to poor brahmin boys studying in college [and living in a hostel] was known as "vaaraanna". Such boys used to eat in different houses on prior arrangement on set days of the week on rotation.  This helped them save some expenses.  It was a tradition followed by many brahmin families as helping others in whatever way possible, considering it as God's service.  

All the years, Somu's memory has a very deep impression in my mind and I often wondered about who he was and where he was.   In the meantime, my wife's friend and our distant relative had hinted about this Somu a couple of years earlier.  He must have inquired his interest on meeting us.  Recently on our second meeting at Somu's brother's family function, last month he mentioned he had retired as head master of a school in the town of Hassan. He was yet again fondly recalling the famililes that served him food in those years, that helped him build a career in life.  He even joyfully introduced me to all his family members. 

My wonderment ended about this Somu whose physical appearance was blank but he used to come white dhoti and shirt with a small towel on his left shoulder.  Somu's dream of meeting the family also ended with that accidental meeting.  Joyful moments.