Fun fact: I haven’t known many good teachers, let alone great ones. At least not the traditional teachers, the ones who get an advanced degree to shape young minds. The people who ended up teaching me life lessons were not professional teachers, but they taught me great things. For example, I learned the art of perseverance from my housekeeper, a fiery woman known for her uproarious laughter who single-handedly manages her household while her husband squanders away much of his income. Despite being bogged by life’s miseries, she always showed up on time, barely taking any leave.
Everyday post work we had a good half-hour chat, like the slice-of-life shows, while it looked like I was helping her, it was mostly the other way around. She had been saving money to gift her two kids a laptop and had gotten additional jobs as well, we’d offered to pay the gap, but she didn’t take any money. Soon, we forgot all about it and went on with our daily lives. Some months later, she came with a box of sweets and broke the news. She had walked the distance of 5 km from her home to our society to boost her savings, she told me later with a look of immense pride while I scowled.
By giving up on the to-and-fro auto ride, she had managed to save nearly 10k. Soon, we had to move houses and say goodbye. On the last day, we had asked her not to come because we had booked movers and packers and didn’t want to burden her, but she showed up at her usual time, prepared a farewell feast for us. We broke bread and shed many tears.
While I read about hustle culture every day, she was the only one who managed to teach me.
Fingers in symphony 