Bearing hope, sowing joy
Wheel Power
By ANTHONY THANASAYAN
Random acts of kindness leave a lasting imprint in the hearts of those on the receiving end.
CHRISTMAS is just round the corner, and this is once again the season for spreading goodwill and cheer to everybody. Christmas is also about miracles and oftentimes, they happen in random acts of kindness when one least expects it.
My first encounter with a real-life Santa Claus was about 40 years ago. Except that in my case, Santa wasn’t wearing pants but a skirt! It was a couple of weeks after a botched surgery that left me in a wheelchair.
I was 10 years old then and thought that my paralysis was only temporary. However, it didn’t take long for me to figure out that things weren’t going the way the surgeon had promised. I was put in a plaster cast from my chest down to my foot for three months.
I was bedridden in a children’s ward and became depressed. In frustration, I started throwing the toys the volunteers in the ward brought to me during playtime. They scurried away, thinking that I was a naughty little brat.
It was then that I met Santarina.
She was an overseas paediatric nurse who worked as a temp in the ward. She visited me at night after her duty ended when the rest of the kids, mainly toddlers, were asleep.
She noticed a battery toy car that a relative had given me, on my locker. I told her I wanted to play with it and was waiting for the time when I could get out of bed as the car needed to be put on the ground in order to operate it.
The nurse said: “Hey, let’s do it now.” She took it out of the box and placed it on the floor. It had fancy lights and could turn around when it bumped into obstacles.
The little car went all around the ward, knocking into other hospital beds and spinning around, with the nurse in tow describing every detail as I tried to visualise what was going on from my bed.
I was so touched that she would do that for me. We became friends after that. Every night, she would drop by for an hour to chat with me.
Although she returned to her country when her term ended a few weeks later, my pal helped me understand that my new life in a wheelchair was only the beginning of many wonderful things to come.
During my young adult life, I met another Santa – this time, the pastor of a nearby church. Also a foreigner, he used to come by in his van and took me to church every Sunday morning.
One Sunday morning, as we were heading to church, he told me about a Swedish warship that was visiting Port Klang.
When he heard that I had never seen a warship, and noting that the ship would be leaving the next day, the pastor turned around and said: “Hang on, we still have time!”
The next thing I knew, we were heading straight to Port Klang from Petaling Jaya.
We got there in an amazing 20 minutes as this Santa certainly didn’t drive like a clergyman.
“Would you like to see the inside?” he asked, as if he was oblivious to the fact that I was in a wheelchair.
The pastor got down and whispered something to the ship’s captain. The latter picked up his walkie-talkie and seconds later, a big and strong navy officer emerged from the ship.
He came over, lifted me like a baby and took me for a quick tour of the ship. I couldn’t believe what was happening.
The pastor and I made it back to church in the nick of time. The choir was just about to sing Joy To The World. His family members were already seated as he had phoned a church member to fetch them to church whilst I was inside the battleship.
Decades have passed but the kindness of the Santas who brought joy to me, lives on in my heart.
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