Athithi Devo Bhava – A calling bell, a fond remembrance
C.P.Hariharan
Cphari_04@yahoo.co.in
When somebody rings the door bell, some people never turn up. Some are kind enough to attend the door bell, of course, after finishing their household chores they were indulging in, say after twenty minutes. Some open the door little bit, half heartedly and openly insult the guest by war of words and give vent to their feelings of anger, frustration and intolerance for being interrupted. Some even fire, how dare you press the door bell button? People in general have apathetic attitude towards a visitor standing at their doors. Some people peep through the door lens and carry on minding their own business leaving the guest fending for himself. Some say that the person concerned to whom the visitor wishes to meet is not available, even if he may be available in the adjacent room. It’s very rare that people attend to the guest at the door on time, in proper manner. In extreme cases, some people do not even mind shutting the door on the face of the visitor irrespective of the fact that whether he or she is a an acquaintance, neighbor, sales man or else a beggar etc. They deliberately behave like this so that the visitor would never ever dare to think of turning up again.
Some people poke their nose even when somebody knocks the neighbors’ door. Such kinds of people always look others with suspicion. Sometimes the visitor may be in genuine need. We have rights only to deny extending alms to a beggar. We have no rights to prevent others from extending help to fellow mortals who are in need. There is nothing wrong in extending help in deserving cases.
People in general think that their value will decrease if they attend the guest on the spot.
Some people never ever call on anybody as they think that visiting somebody whether it is relative or otherwise would hurt their ego or their prestige.
In general, if we analyze, nobody calls on anybody without a purpose. Nowadays, courtesy demands ringing up before calling on anybody so as to confirm their availability as also to ensure their convenience. But, the words like courtesy, responsibility etc .have gone out of dictionary when we look into other contexts like keeping one ‘s words.
There is a saying ‘’Athithi devo bhava “. Guest is considered to be God. Hence, we are expected to treat them in polite ways.
In a case, a lady’s husband had met with an accident and was no more on the spot. When a man known to him went to his house to pass on the message, she did not even bother to open the door at all. After a long wait, she came out as she had to go to the market. She was so engrossed in watching TV as if she had nothing to ponder over .She never knew that time had come to remove the furniture in their reception room.
We do not know what happens to us the next moment. Hence, we should treat our guests in proper ways.
When our own relatives call on us, we do not look at them. Rather, we tend to look at how big is their luggage so as to assess how long are they going to be with us. We make a quick assessment about how much we will have to shell out in terms of money by the time we see them off.
We are expected to receive our guests wholeheartedly. But, virtually we receive our guests hollow heartedly. God tolerates those who tolerate others.
Once upon a time, frequency of social interaction was so much so that people never thought in terms of monetary outflow while entertaining guests. In old golden days, world was more skewed towards philanthropic coexistence in contrast to what we witness in today’s misanthropic world. But, today earning a penny has itself become a herculean, formidable task and spending definitely pinches everybody’s pocket.
Many people apprehend that the visitor may seek a favor and will over stay or even fantasize sticking with them forever like a fevicol. Even a four to five days’ stay is considered to be a long overstay and they may make mountains out of mole hills if they dare to overstay. They call up every relatives circle and gossip about guests’ over stay. Many a time, they indirectly express their unhappiness about the presence of guests. They come up with so many excuses to let the guest go to hell. They deliberately avoid entertaining anybody and prefer to spend their life time within four walls. They cannot even imagine about compromising on their freedom and privacy. It is always better to smell the rat and pack up our baggage before they throw out our luggage. We should make others happy by our absence if they are not happy with our presence. People in general cherish and value our absence more than our presence.
A man originally had an LIG flat. Since so much of space was available, he built two more LIG flats adjacent to his original LIG flat. His house was on ground floor. Now, his house is a palatial bungalow leaving no marks to identify that it is a govt. allotted flat .Still, he is not satisfied. Now, he wishes to build one more LIG flat as some more space is left over. He is not bothered about whether neighbors have parking space or not. He has put ac in every room. All the doors and windows of his house always remain closed. Even fresh air and sunrays cannot dare to enter his house.But for the ac, his house would have been a suffocating hell. Do you think such a man will ever even think of entertaining any fellow mortal?
People in general, are so materialistic that they never care fellow mortals. They are very calculative despite they know that their calculations rarely go right. If all our calculations go right, then there is no God.
There is a saying that at the least we should keep good rapport with four people and even with eight if we are obese, and even more if we wish some people should accompany us to the grave yard when we will be no more. It may sound little philosophical. But, that is the reality.
We are only guests in this world. We should always remember that we have to go sooner or later.
That does not mean that we should always be pessimistic. Still, we should be aware and mature enough to be conscious about realities while dealing with people.
We may behave cruelly, still our own conscience will kill us specifically when we are alone.
It is easy to behave rudely and get angry even at the throw of a hat. But, when we are in troubled water s, nobody would turn up to rescue us. Hence, we need to mind our words. We have to remember that outspoken words cannot be taken back.
We are living in a self centered and materialistic world. Still, we have to keep good rapport with everybody so that there will be somebody to attend us in case of exigencies and emergencies.
C.P.Hariharan
Cphari_04@yahoo.co.in
