Friday encounters

What began as the beginning of yet another mundane weekend, turned out to be a memorable Friday evening outing. Perchance we had decided TGIF to be our weekly crib night venue for this week, and indeed, we ran into someone we knew :)

As the desperation from Brazilians and Dutch alike increased towards the dying moments of a tense World Cup quarter final, in walked a family of three - an elderly couple, and their 20-something son. Simply dressed, unassuming, looking for a table for the evening. They weren't attended to at first - I guess a non-glamorous, silent entry to such places does not immediately guarantee you any attention. After a while, the family got a table, but there was still no waiter around to serve the table. The father slowly walked up to the place that stacked menu cards, picked one and slowly walked back. In India, unless you are a celebrity (or not) of the flashy variety, I guess you do not get the attention you deserve (or not).

Not even if your gestures alone - forget press statements - can move markets. Not even if you are the governor of RBI.

We had been tracking the activities at that table for a while. Suddenly, the stunning Dutch victory seemed insignificant. Following that came the realization that the table wasn't quite surrounded by people clamouring to meet him. What began as a surprise, and gradually evolved into a national embarrassment sometime later, was the fact that no one in the entire room seemed to recognize him. And we are not talking of village bumpkins here - this is city-bred folks, mostly salaried class, a multitude of whose daily household decisions are affected by what this man decides. Two days ago in a discussion with a colleague, I had vehemently opposed the notion that as a society, we (Indians) were getting dumber. Now suddenly I wasn't so confident.

We walked up to him and introduced ourselves. As a father would, he introduced us to his son, who, it turned out, was connected to us through just two degrees of separation. We chatted up a bit, conveyed our pleasure at meeting them, and skipped away like a bunch of teenagers who just met their star cricketer in the neighbourhood lift.  We didn't really need an autograph. Any currency note in this country would suffice, thank you.

What completely took me aback, and very pleasantly so, was the outright humility and the simplicity of the man. It was just like an outing that any ordinary family would have, content in the company of their loved ones, as if the surroundings don't really matter. It didn't matter that their waiter came to the table much later than usual. You don't need to assert how important you are by jumping out, holding the waiter's collar, and hollering out 'Jaanta nahin main kaun hoon?'

In a society that is constantly falling over itself in raising its standards to the bottom, here was a living example of a man of power with humility, responsibility with modesty, authority with simplicity. it made my day, my week, my month.

I find it difficult to fathom a scene if one of the plethora of our actors/TV personalities were to walk in a restaurant tomorrow, and be completely at ease with the fact that no one around recognized them. By no means am I trying to generalize, but I can guess with a reasonably high amount of confidence that the pretentiousness and the unease would calmly give them away.

Reminds me of an old adage - true in sports, more so in life.

Form is temporary, class is permanent.