Sai made me realize that I must work hard without giving up

Sairam friends,

I enjoyed tonights rain in Chennai. Yes. Its raining here. Only in the afternoon, I wrote how much I worry about the hot climate in this city and within few hours, Sai made me have memorable experience in today’s rain. I went with my uncle, aunt and parents to Vadapalani Murugan temple. It was beautiful to see Murugan. There’s another temple of Vishnu besides this were I loved Aadhi Mahalakshmi.

My Ma takes so much time to sit that my Uncle moved the car while she was still standing out. She was holding the door and thankfully nothing happened. When you park the car in the middle of the road, anyone in drivers seat will be anxious to move away and it happens.

I got a call from a devotee who have been following StarSai for over 3-4 years. He had mailed me and I gave my number promising that I shall surely meet him.

Meeting Utkarsh was important for many reasons.

Five years back, I was speaking to one of my friend Lavanya about my Sai friends. During the conversation, I mentioned about Manisha from Delhi, Preeti from Indore, Vidhya from Mumbai and some girls spreaded across India and abroad. She suddenly asked “Unaku pasanga Sai friends aaga maataangala – Dont you have Sai friends who are of your gender”. She said you only speak about girls and not guys. Even guys worship Sai. How come not one is your Sai friend. That was an insult to me because I write for every Sai devotee. I write from children, Men and women. Old and young. Smart and the weak.

I tried to explain her saying, may be, some guys are also reading my articles but they don’t feel like writing to me but mostly elderly women and girls tell me their stories and are more open to me. I added ” I know lots of guys and men in the saibaba temple in Coimbatore and they all are my friends”. She said ” I am asking about Sai friends who write to you.”

I could not speak much. I told Baba, I am here to serve you. I want to reach everyone equally. Even kids in School write to me their problems. Once a girl who moved from U.S to India told me how much she struggles to cope up in school. Later, she also wrote me that shes going good by Sai grace. Now a days, even if girls write me their problems in relationship, I don’t feel like replying as my words can only heal them and it can’t do much change. To change your life, Go direct to Sai. I am after all just trying to cool you down with my words.

Mostly, men write me after they are married. Like financial problems, problems in career or some guys ask why Saibaba is not helping them get admission in specific university abroad. Men seek advice after they are married and face some issues. Before that, they can easily manage.

In most of the articles where I mentioned about trying to be pure and taking care of parents, I only write for Men. Though there are families where girl takes all the responsibility, its a Son’s duty to take care of his parents.( Unless you are the only girl child)

Still, why on Earth Lavanya complains that I don’t speak about Sai friends who are Men.

It took more than 5 years for me to prove Lavanya wrong. I can assure even men get benefitted by what I write and some do follow StarSai regularly for years too.

This is not the first guy who wanted to meet me. I had got some mails earlier but honestly, did not got opportunity to meet. I told Utkarsh, that I am going to a Shiva temple and after that will reach West Mambalam Saibaba temple. He said that he’s from Rajasthan and asked me to clarify the location of the temple as he’s new to Chennai.

I told him its in Jayshankar street in West Mambalam. I assured that I will reach within 1 and half hours.

We reached Shiva’s Vengeeshwarar temple. As soon as we got in my aunt wanted to have prasad they were offering. So I stood in the que to get the lemon rice. Once again, food is important than God and darshan..ha ha…

It was such a divine place, clean and looked auspicious. The Goddess was nice too.My Unlce showed me the metro train running behind the train. It was good to see. I like the trains in Mumbai irrespective of their crowd and wish to travel by metro sometime soon. Lets see.

My aunt wanted me to come to her home, have coffee and go to meet my friend. I called up Utkarsh and he said that he has already reached Saibaba temple. So they dropped me in a corner from where I can get share auto. While standing in that corner I heared Aarti some where near by. I walked and found there’s a little temple for Lord Vaashtu Bagavan. Surprisingly, they have kept a nice Saibaba statue near Vaashtu bagavan. It was nice to hear the song of Sai being played in this temple.

I worshiped within 2 minutes and walked out. I did not got share auto. So took ordinary auto and reached Saibaba temple in West Mambalam. It was really crowded and utkarsh assumed I won’t even come in. Ha ha…he has read my articles that I used to stand in parking space of Nagasai Mandir at Coimbatore during Thursdays.

I entered the temple, had good darshan of Saibaba and walked out with a Jilebi given to me as prasad.  Utkarsh was donating some money and I called him. He asked how you know me. I said, I can identify you.

We started speaking for a while and walked to the Dhuni. He said, that he used to read StarSai for over 4 years and found there’s lots of similarity between him and myself.

He told me that he liked the video I made couple of days before. I told him “I wanted to speak about Sai but worry that my accent isn’t good.” He said that he watched it over 20 times.

It was crowded in the temple and hence we walked to near by hotel. We had dosa there. He started telling me about his struggles from school days, going through IIT coaching in Kota, doing his B.Tech in Jaipur, his failed Job search in Bangalore and finally Sai took him to Chennai for a job in a reputed government organization.

I was surprised that this guy knew every single thing about me and my nature. He said “You don’t like crowd”. ” You ask people to give” and hence seems he used to do little good deeds in his home town. He said ” Don’t worry that you are not doing anything productive. Already you are touching lives of millions including me”.

Mean while he said “You like Coffee right. I wanted to have coffee sometime back when it was raining and had none to share. Today its raining and there can’t be a better person to have coffee than you”.

In the next 5 minutes, we were having Coffee. I drank all the coffee with in a minute while his was remaining. The coffee wasn’t hot.  We spoke a lot when it rained heavily. I told him that I am happy for doing good through StarSai but there must be something beyond this. I wanted to inspire people to continue education, write about technology, innovation etc and hence plan to launch a new site.

He said that you need a team to work on that and gave me some good suggestions.

Something which I liked about him is the way he remembers most of my articles. He told me about the article I wrote – India’s lost Bandwidth. I told him “Yes. There’s lots of good on the web and our people doesn’t know its value. So I wanted to create a media to write about all things good – Startups, Tech, Courses, Filmmaking etc.

I mentioned how much I tried to create a media platform in different brand names but failed each time. Hence, I finally made it in my name since I assumed that it was blessed by Saibaba.

He said the reason you failed could be because we don’t try anything consistantly and give up. I told him that’s true. I get deviated easily.

Further, he told me that its not in a brand name but how much we work hard for it. Like Apple is name of a fruit but now when someone mentions Apple, we visualze gadgets. So its in how you build the brand in the minds of people.

Later, we decided to leave. It was raining still. What we both liked about this temple is that Saibaba is cute. I am not telling what I felt uncomfortable with. Saibaba asked me not to mention this. It happens even in Shirdi in Dwarakamai. So better I keep within myself.

He helped me take an auto while he took another. The auto man asked for 150 Rs. I told him ” I will give you but its too high. You cheated me as its raining”. We can pay a lot to people like this but we must let them know its not fair.

Sai grace, I have money to give and some may not have.

In the end, its all about Money.

Utkarsh said something my Sister used to tell me always

“Don’t think of Money when you follow what you love to do”.

He added, Money is important but what you are doing is already touching lives of millions.

Twice he touched my knee showing how much he respects me as Sai’s servant and I felt embarrassed. This is a sweet gesture from many of the north Indian guys I have come across. If they see you as someone who have guided them like a Guru, they show it by this gesture. When I was a faculty in the film school in Mumbai, some guys used to touch my knee when they leave with a beautiful smile and not to mention the Saibaba photo they gifted me on Guru purnima.

Infact, I too see Utkarsh and several of my Sai friends as my Guru and wanted to fall in their feet because someway Saibaba speaks to me through them.

So it was raining in Chennai and I enjoyed with Coffee! we had it twice!

He told me, “I don’t find Chennai too hot as I am from Rajasthan”

We see things based on relative facts we are used to.

So I apologize to all Chennaiates for calling your beautiful city too Hot!

Someone from Rajasthan finds it normal. Atleast when its not summer!

How true!

We always comapre things and complain based on what we have experienced before.

Life is good and Sai is taking care of all of us.

I must learn to see the positive aspects where ever I go and in my own life.

I have planned to work hard to make what I have in mind a reality!

Om Sai Ram

Love,

Venkat