It really is a small world
Monday, September 22nd, 2008
Backstory
In 1999 I went to India to do a series of lectures and some consulting on the use of technology in classrooms to help students with learning difficulties. I made this trip with a good friend and colleague Bart Pisha who is also an expert on the use of technology in classrooms. Neither of us had been to India before so this was a very big trip and experience for both of us. One of the schools we visited in Bombay was the Jai Vakeel School for young people with severe cognitive disabilities. In this school students learned various skills: academic, social, and crafts like weaving, sewing, and other handicrafts.
We toured the school with it’s director, Tehmi Schroff and the head of their occupational therapy group who’s name I don’t remember. Tehmi explained not only what was going on in each classroom but what it meant in terms of the lives of these students. She also explained the research they were doing there.
Richard speaking to the faculty of the Jai Vakeel School in Bombay
After touring the school Bart and I did a presentation for members of the faculty and administration, mostly about our own experiences growing up with learning disabilities and how we had managed to work through problems and find our individual ways but we also gave them an overview of what was going on back in the US in special education. Frankly, in retrospect, this relatively poor sheltered workshop was miles ahead of what might go on at an equivalent institution in the US.
Bart and I bid Tehmi and her school farewell and pushed on to many other schools in Bombay and Delhi over the next two weeks. We came home overwhelmed by the experience and to this day we both feel it was the best trip of our lives. We never heard from Tehmi again.
Note: These images are photos I took in India with my Olympus Stylus point and shoot film camera. They weren’t great images and they’re even worse as I shot them this morning with my 5D.
Fast Forward Ten Years
We live in the town of Warren, Connecticut, population 1300. About a year ago, some good friends of ours invited us for dinner and invited another couple who live in Warren who they had just met, Adil and Zarinna Mulla. The Mullas are wonderful, down to earth people who were born in Bombay but have lived in the US for most of their adult lives. Our conversation was wonderfully wide ranging, from US politics (we’re all Obama supporters) to my trip to India.
The view from the Mulla’s deck, Warren, Connecticut
When the Mulla’s found out I was a photographer they invited me over to check out the views at their place and ever since that first visit Zarinna has been calling me on mornings when there is fog on the Shepaug reservoir for me to photograph. We’ve become good friends of both Adil and Zarinna.
Zarinna Mulla
Knowing that I’d never shot a wedding before, Zarinna and Adil’s daughter and her fiance asked me to photograph their wedding. While I was flattered I was also quite nervous. They had 200 people come from all over the world and they wanted photographs of the event. Thank god the images turned out well and shooting the wedding was a lot of fun as was meeting such a diverse group of people.
The evening before the wedding I was at Zarinna’s house for a rehearsal and her immediate family who had flown in from India was there staying at the house. There was a lot of excitement in the air about the wedding but also a bit of jet lag and exhaustion.
I got myself out of the way and stood over by the kitchen sink next to an older woman who was washing dishes. We glanced at each other politely and she went back to work. A while later I asked her where she’d come from and she said Bombay and that she was Zarinna’s mother. She asked me where I lived and I said down the road in the same town and that I was a friend of her daughter’s. I asked her what she did in Bombay and she said she ran a school. I said that I’d been to Bombay and had been to some schools nine years ago, which school did she run.
She said: “I run the Jai Vakeel School.”
I wasn’t sure I’d heard it right so I asked her to repeat it.
“I run the Jai Vakeel School. My name is Tehmi Schroff.”
My jaw dropped. This was the same woman I’d met almost ten years earlier in India. The same woman who did the research on sheltered workshops and occupational therapy for young people with mental retardation and the same woman I had the pictures of in an album at home.
Tehmi and Richard in Warren, Connecticut
She said I’d looked familiar; she asked me if I was “Richard” or “Bart” as time had conflated the names and we had a long look at one another as we realized the odds of this happening.
Later I drove home and picked up the album from my India trip just to make sure it was real and in fact it was: the mother of my good friend Zarinna Mulla is the same person who I’d met randomly in India while touring dozens of schools.
If that doesn’t make you believe the world is small, nothing will.
Amazing, Richard.
Mike, it really is. I can’t get over it. I was wondering how to share it in a way that didn’t bore people. I hope this little story isn’t too much. I’m simply blown away by it.
That is a fantastic story indeed, Richard. Love it!
This gave me chills. Incredible.
Amazing. Things that like happen **just** often enough to keep things inspired. What a fantastic story.
No, your little stories are never too much. I appreciate the concern, but your writing is always enjoyable.
Richard, absolutely amazing. The chances seem so high that you wouldn’t ever meet Tehmi again, and then to find she’s the mother of your good friend and neighbor, Zarinna! Wow. Six degrees of separation….
A really great story. Amazing…
Mike, thanks, I appreciate the kind words and feedback.
Gary, 1 degree of separation. I wish you were here to take shots of all of us together. Everyone was so involved in the wedding that my little story sort of got lost in the excitement.
Caitlin: of all of my friends, you’re “international” enough to really get this in a very deep way. I know you have connections on many continents and maybe given the number of them the odds are greater for you to have one of these “miracle” connections. I hope so, it’s a very nice feeling. Hard to explain, almost a bit too weird.
Brilliant and heart warming Richard!
What a wonderful story and what a surprise. I often think that when you do something really good, it always comes back to you in some way, just like this.
Jon, I like that way of looking at it. I guess my India trip was ultimately good and this was a great payoff.
a true blessing! was so satisfying to read this when much of what i read (news and blog-wise) is so dark.
Will, exactly and the exact reason I was anxious to post it. Thanks.
Richard, this is a beautiful story and you’re a wonderful story teller. I am always looking forward to the “surprises” that you have in store for your readers. I never get bored of your articles and this one is particularly touching.
That really is such a great story – and how I love the fact that you were stood right next to each other.
Thanks Andreas, I was struggling to tell it succinctly yet with enough detail so it would have some effect. I’m delighted you enjoyed this.
Sarah, hey you’re enough of a world traveler and definitely a “connector” so that my guess is you’re as likely as anyone to have one of these connections happen. Yes, it was amazing and if I’d had my act together I’d have gotten Zarinna in on that picture too. I didn’t have my “blog” hat on and my “wedding photographer” hat was sort of falling off so I had to really work to keep it on, if you know what I mean.
Richard – this brought tears to my eyes.
I remember your story of how you used your AlphaSmart 2000 as a tray during your flight, tho I can’t remember if it was there or back. There was an accompanying picture of you and Bart with your AS2Ks balanced on your knees.
This is probably the longest piece I remember reading on your site here. Keep them coming!
Chet, Yes, you’re right, we did use our AlphaSmarts on both the trip over and back and I had a picture of us doing that up at the old AlphaSmart web site for years. Good memory.
I’ve got other long pieces up at the site, they’re just buried now. Check this one out: Irving’s Pool Table. Or this one: A Climbing Story.
The world is indeed round… ^_^
You must still be in awe now….
Ya Ya. Yes, every time someone comments here I think of this and get worked up all over again. You, as a world traveler, probably have a better idea of the odds for this than most people. This is so very rare…
An interesting anectode and very well presented too. Just the right length, I for one enjoyed it thoroughly.
Yes, we do come across these little ‘miracles’ in life every once in a while – it makes life so interesting and keeps our faiths alive too.
Thanks for directing me to this page. Your photographs are superb! As an additional bonus, I now ‘know’ who was I mailing to on gmail today.
Keep up the good work.
Prakash: Thanks for looking reading and commenting.
I said to my wife (the author of the content in Confusing Words) how amazing it is that in this day and age there are people on the other side of the world using it and reading content that she wrote ten years ago (many of the examples date it).
We don’t take for granted that people around the world find it useful. I wish we had the time to get back to work on it, it was quite a lot of fun.
Thanks for being in touch and letting me know about the email bounce.
How lovely! It is a small world, but it also proves one of Salman Rushdie’s theories:
Indians are like sand… we get everywhere.
Puneet: Well said (quoted).