It’s not unusual for strangers to go out of their way to help others, whether it’s stopping to assist a stranded motorist or driving across town to return a lost wallet. But not many would do what a DHL worker in Kerala recently did. An American woman described the kind deed in a viral post on Instagram, where she goes by the name India Witkin. While visiting a beach town in Kerala, Witkin went to a DHL office to ship something to America. “The DHL worker and I exchanged numbers since all transactions in India are basically made over WhatsApp. I had to go to the ATM to withdraw cash, but accidentally left my card inside the machine,” she wrote.
She didn’t realize her mistake until she had traveled to India’s capital city of Thiruvananathapuram, about five hours away. Witkin, who says she has a Hindu mom and atheist father, called the DHL worker to check the ATM for her card and “prayed to every Hindu God and Goddess I could think of.” About 24 hours later, she got good news from the worker: he had found the card on top of the ATM. But there was another problem: It was a Sunday and she was leaving India in another 36 hours, not enough time for him to ship the card to her.
Later that evening, after she had given up hope, she got a surprise: The man called her and told her to come outside. He had driven six hours in an auto-rickshaw with two friends on his day off work to return the debit card. “When I tried to give him money, he refused,” Witkin wrote. “Said he knew I was travelling on a budget and to keep it for myself. His name? Krishna. The Hindu god of love, compassion, and protection. Tell me karma doesn’t exist. Hopefully, this story restores your faith in humanity, because it did for me.”
Compiled and partly written by Indian humorist MELVIN DURAI, author of the novel Bala Takes the Plunge. [Comments? Contributions? Please email us at melvin@melvindurai.com. We welcome jokes, quotes, online clips, and more.]