My boat’s getting rocked! Day 1

Have you ever had a string of embarrassing moments, moments when you feel a little lonely and moments of utter helplessness? Well, I had times like that last week – three days at a stretch! Here’s my account of Day 1.

Monday, I headed back home after a long day at work only to find my apartment complex cloaked in darkness. There had been a power cut. Then at the entrance, I was stopped by one of the security guys who informed me that the Electricity Board guys had come to disconnect my power as I had not paid my bill for the month. I was stumped for I knew I had paid my bill. My day could not have turned worse. An unexpected delay at work, followed by a power cut and topped off with this news. However, the apartment admin had intervened and therefore, I was not left in the dark.

Now here’s where it gets interesting. Just before leaving office, I had cleaned out my ATM to do some shopping. So naturally, I was not sure if I had enough to pay my bill because I did not know how much I had to pay, fine included. I headed back to my office to pick up my EB Card so that the bill could be paid the next day. I also decided to check if by some miracle there would be money in my account. The chances were slim as I was not sure if my salary had been credited into my account. Anyways, I did and guess what! There was money there!

Now I could have just dismissed it as a stroke of luck working in tandem with the undeniable phenomenon of coincidences. However, only when I got to office the next day, I saw the mail from my accounts team regretting that for some technical reasons, they were unable to credit our salaries into our accounts. That’s when my heart began to race faster. So how come money had become available to me? I do not have the answer but for some reason, my salary had been credited in that 15-minute gap. The next day my bill was paid the EB and that’s when I realized what had been deducted was the annual deposit and not my bill. Anyway to make up for the faux pas, they did not even ask for the fine. And I learnt a couple of things here:

- Sometimes, it seems as though the world conspires against you but actually it only seems so. It’s not a fact.
- Knowledge can sometimes corrupt you. If I had seen that mail from the Accounts team, I might have not even bothered to check my ATM.
- There are usually strangers to do you a good turn like my apartment admin guys who ensured that the power was not cut off.
- Similarly, it was good that I had reached home late that night as the power came back within an hour. Or I would have had to stay in darkness for several hours.

So you see, I really had no reason to complain. It had become a great situation to exercise my faith and get that all-empowering assurance that there was someone out there who looks out for me!