20/7/2018
I just remembered something from the past, something that may seem very trivial but I realised of great value.
This was sometime in '89. I was supposed to fly off to Leh in Ladakh from Delhi. The flights got cancelled two days consecutively due to bad weather and then on the third morning my employers sent me to the Srinagar resort and from there to take a chance once more. Well there I was in our company boathouse waiting for the weather to clear and I met a young girl here. She was also an employee and her most important job was to take those guests who booked for treks, on a trans-himalayan trek from Kashmir to Ladakh, a seventeen-day trek. Whew! I was still stuck in Srinagar the day she was leaving with her troup. I had nothing to give her as a parting gift except the biggest size Cadburys chocolate, which I had purchased the evening before. She loved it and as most of us know chocolates are very important when on such treks.
The weather cleared a couple of days later and I flew off to my destination to look after the Leh resort. I got busy with my work. I loved it. The guests came here for 3 days and then flew off to other resorts in Pahalgam or bandhavgarh or Nepal. So there was a constant arrival and departure, and I also got busy helping the arrivals to acclimatise etc. In this melee there were three ladies from East Germany. I got to know them a little better than the rest. May be they too felt at ease with me, so we got talking. I learned they were potato farmers from East Germany. This was before the 'Berlin wall fall'. All of them had families back home but had saved to make this 'ladies only' trip. In one of our conversations, speaking about families I mentioned my eldest son was not exactly normal and that he could not study like my other normal kids. These ladies got concerned and shared some facts about how they had facilities in their country for such children. they gave me some of their leaflets and promised to send me more details once they reached home. And they gave me a huge home-made fudge the day they left!!!! Oh me! It was so delicious, full of all sorts of nuts and whatnot! It seems the ladies carried some of these home-made fudge with them, just in case they ran short of food during their travel. God gave me so much in return for the little unselfish parting gift I did in Srinagar! God is great. I shared it with my colleagues and it lasted for days - it was so big!
One other thing is that in those days East Germany had government facilities for differently abled children. And yes the ladies did send me more details and other educational tips by post. The tips helped me immensely. Thank you, dear ladies from East Germany.
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