FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2024
Sathappan Narayanan
In Thirukkural 789, Thiruvalluvar defined friendship as below:
“Friendship may be said to be on its throne when it possesses the power of supporting one at all times and under all circumstances”.
I am sure every one of you would have undergone such beautiful experiences of friendship in every stage of your life. Friends to play with, study with, spend leisure time with, go to places with, discuss anything and everything with, strategise and execute business plans and be successful with and console failure with – we need friends in every stage of our life.
I did enjoy such mutual friendship from my school days and practised nurturing such relationships with my superiors, peers, subordinates and customers to the best of my ability in my long professional career too. Let me recall one such lovely incident: It was my last day of college at Madurai. Having written the last exam I was relaxed and as per pre plan I was supposed to board the train a day after to Chennai to my brother’s place to assist him in his business and as well in search of a job! It was a different era wherein the job opportunities were limited. After reaching Chennai, my friend came to meet me.
The surprising factor was he came in a brand new Lambretta scooter. I am talking about 70’s - the era of closed economy prevailed in India wherein just two brands of scooters (Bajaj and Lambretta) , three brands of motorcycles (Royal Enfield, Jawa and Rajdoot) and two brands of cars (Ambassador and Fiat) were available in India. Apart from Bajaj and Lambretta there was the news of the launching of Vijay super scooter. In such an era, the general feeling was that the blessed are the ones who own, drive or even travel as pillion riders in a scooter. I was so thrilled to travel as a pillion rider of that new Lambretta and requested my friend about the possibility of teaching me scooter driving. Though it was a new scooter he instantly accepted to teach me.
Believe me I learnt the nuances of scooter driving within two days of a two-hour session with my friend. It’s the word of mouth motivation by my friend that I learnt it so fast. I was extremely thrilled that I am going to Chennai with a newly acquired skill. It so happened that within a few days of my arrival in Chennai, my brother too bought a new Vijay super scooter and I became the expert driver from day one. My brother was happy with my new skill and encouraged me to go places solo or with him to help him in his business. Subsequently it so happened that I got landed in and decided to pursue sales career as my profession and the driving skill of both two and four wheeler helped me a lot in that profession. Starting point for all these developments was the first driving lesson imparted so willingly by my dear friend Chandramohan.
It’s time to express my sincere gratitude to all those lovely class mates, colleagues, peers, superiors, subordinates, customers and family members who helped me a lot in all walks of my humble life… I am so thankful to every one of you.
“Like learning, the friendship of the noble, the more it is cultivated, the more delightful does it become” - Thirukkural 783.
