Visitor and the visited

One of the regular happenings at our home, when we lived in Chennai, Vellore or Pondichery, was visitors at our home. Of course students were the regular ones.

Visitors bring a new content and ambience to our lives. 

Rev. Peter Miller, the vicar of St. Mary's church at Chennai was someone whom we got to know, when we lived at Chennai. One rainy evening, when the cyclone had hit the coast,  we were sitting around a candle light in our home. With no electricity for the whole day and the rain still incessant, and the streets flooded, that was not a pleasant evening at all. 

We heard a knock at our door around 8pm with a familiar voice, asking, 'can I have some food'. When we opened the door, we saw Peter standing on the verandah fully drenched in rain and looking exhausted. On hearing that, someone he knew well, a gardener, had lost his house in the rain and wind, he had set out to go to Ambattur in the morning. As the area was flooded, he had to leave his car and walk about two kilometers on foot waddling through knee deep water. He spent the whole day walking between the public shelter, where the family had come to live temporarily and different provision shops, to get them food, clothes, cooking vessels, etc. He returned only after he made share that they had enough to mange for the next three days, after which he had planned to return. 

As he sat down after changing into borrowed clothes and ate bread, fruits and pudding, sipping black coffee in between, we felt drawn by his loving self giving response to human need. Peter felt good that he knew us  well enough, to drop in before he proceeded to his home, which was another ten kilometres away. 

A visitor often returns having been touched by welcome and hospitality. A visitor coms calling when he has something to offer or needs something.  The visited can receive much refreshment and cheer or feel quickened to some realities and consciousness. We were able to get involved in helping Peter's initiative to build a few thatched houses, for those who lost their houses. This was another gain from the visit. 

One casualty in a technology driven world is personal visit, as telephone calls, SMSs and e-mails seem to have become the main links for staying connected. A personal visit has many advantages for the visitor and the visited.  

Now that we do not live in the hospital campus, we have far less visitors at our cottage. We take more efforts now to visit, which is one way of adjusting to this new environment.

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)