Stories of Kindness from Around the World

This Diwali, I planned to celebrate the festival by doing some kind acts. I emailed few colleagues to join me however all were busy with festival celebration. I also had enough work and a meeting got scheduled on the Diwali day itself hence i had to visit office.

I was thinking it won't be possible but then I got an idea of distributing sweets right near office. Looked like a good idea but I had not made any full fledged plans.

When I reached office I already started feeling bad for security and kitchen staff who were working on holiday, so they got tagged. Around lunch time, I wanted to go and purchase sweets when I thought of buying pizza for lunch, along with giving sweets to pizza hut workers, who were also at work on holiday. This was pretty exciting as young boys n girls work at pizza hut and i was sure they would be so surprised. I ordered a pizza but told them I would collect it myself after 25 min. 

Now, i went straight to a nice tea shop which also sells quite good, fresh 'gulab jamuns', a nice sweet. These were a little expensive as per my original plan considering i wanted to buy sweets for staff as well later. However, I let this idea go, I could afford them anyways. I purchased these and went to Pizza hut, I was already happy, excited.

At Pizza hut, I made sure that I paid for my order first and then told the girls at the counter about the sweets. They were very excited and joyful. I felt the atmosphere immediately changed,as they told others about it. However, they maintained professionalism and kept serving customers. While, I was having my pizza one boy came to me and offered me some garlic bread free, which I humbly refused as I couldn't eat any more. He still wanted to call me later and deliver the bread for dinner, which I refused politely, and told them, "please enjoy sweets for diwali as you teenagers are working on holiday."

While I was leaving Pizza Hut, they gave me a big 'Happy Diwali' cheer that was unforgettable. 

I even wanted to give something to another teenage shopkeeper who often spoke to me in a friendly way so I bought a juice for her and gave her, which she politely accepted. There was an emotional, soft feeling in the air which brought small tears in my eyes hence i left her shop immediately.

Next, I went and purchased rasogullas and sohan papdi boxes for security and kitchen staff who were working. The security couldn't understand when i handed the box and i had to tell them it was sweets for them. Again smiles with surprises.

At kitchen, when I went with the box, their manager called everyone and asked them to have sweets. There was an instant transformation to a festival happiness from a serious work environment. They were all smiling.
 
By now, I was so happy and fulfilled that I knew I celebrated my festival better than before and with so many people. While I was just leaving the office, the receptionist called me. She was laughing and happy about the sweets, which I thought she didn't get as sweets were less for many people were working, which I didn't realize.

However, the staff shared it among themselves and made sure everyone got it :) I told her probably sweets were less for everyone but she said 'Its not about sweets , its about the spirit'. Yeah , we agreed and smiled.

Some of these people still smile at me and remind of the most wonderful festival celebration which made all of us relate to each other as members of a family in few moments.