Chapter 12
Shaan eagerly waited for Kelly. Lately he had been thinking about her a lot. He wondered why? He answered to self, “Perhaps because she is an independent thinker. Perhaps because she is very beautiful. Perhaps because of both.”
While he was engrossed in such thoughts, Kelly entered his apartment; the door to his apartment was open. Kelly presumed it was because he was expecting her.
Shaan was so much immersed in thinking about her; he did not notice her arrival. Kelly felt amused at his concentration on something that she was not aware of. She smiled and got curious to know of Shaan’s inner thoughts.
After waiting for a while she coughed delicately to attract his attention. He was startled. He blurted out, “Hey there. I am sorry I did not notice you. Please come on in.”
“No. I won’t come in. Let us get going or else we will be late. And why were you so much lost that you did not notice a beautiful girl? Did I disturb you in the middle of something very important?”
“Oh, nothing really. Not at all,” He replied awkwardly. He dismissed further conversation on this topic. He exhibited a bit of shyness. It did not escape Kelly’s observation of him.
As they sat in Kelly’s red colored Porsche, Kelly said, “Shaan, let me fill you in with stuff about the group we will be meeting today. We call the group as ‘Humanity Forum’.”
“OK, go ahead. You own a brilliant car.”
“Oh, it’s my mom’s. Thanks anyways. Let me now tell you about this group called ‘Humanity Forum’. Right now it’s a group of some 45 odd people in San Jose. The group got evolved gradually over past five to six years. They are a youngish set. These guys are highly open-minded, intelligent and active. They are proponents of very high human values. We are totally boundary less group; we do not draw any kind of boundaries between the human beings. Guys and girls from various professionals and religious backgrounds have come together in this group. So we have engineers, doctors, scientists, professors, business executives, lawyers, politicians and so on. And we have atheists, agnostics, Hindus, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, Sikhs and the religion-less. We have whites, blacks, yellows, browns and all kinds of mixed or other conceivable colors. We have people who originally belonged to different nations. Their mother tongues are different from each other. In short everyone is welcome provided he or she is a humanist with large mind and heart, can question every established thing, is flexible and willing to change for better, provided he or she thinks, feels and does good for self and others and provided he is a genuine human being.”
“Coming from such diverse backgrounds of different nationalities, races, colors, religions, faiths, beliefs, languages and professions, do they really see eye to eye with each other? Or do they always end up in agreeing to disagree? What really makes your group tick?”
“You are right. Basically each one is unique.”
“That’s my exact point. In order to execute any idea, first people must come to a common ground. This kind of uniqueness can be a serious impediment in consensus building.”
“The uniqueness brings in lots of scenarios and alternatives. But with clarity and unity of our objectives, with openness of mind, flexibility and transparency, process of consensus building becomes quite smooth. People are aware of incompleteness, inadequacies and deficiencies of their cultural, ethnic and religious learnings and so they pick up the best from everywhere and everyone in order to arrive at a common platform. They invariably subordinate the incomplete, inaccurate, deficient, inadequate and often misinterpreted commandments and dogmas of their cultures and religions in favor of one single thing that binds them together which is ‘humanity’. Everything gets focused towards ‘humanity’ ultimately.”
“Interesting. But do you really find species of this nature- it’s a tall order. You seem to be aiming at zero hatred-100% love affair. It is rather extremely difficult proposition.” Shaan interjected.
“You are right. Not many people in the world will come forward and meet these credentials as of the current times. That’s the reason over five to six years we are just about 45 people in the group. But the people are changing for better though painfully sluggishly. But there is still hope.”
“Yes, I can see that.”
“Hope the world and its people will change one day and large numbers of people will carry forward the work we have started with still better spirit than we have inculcated.”
“I hope for the same.”
“So are you game to meet them?”
“Definitely. I look forward to meet them.”
By this time they reached a school’s premises.
Kelly informed Shaan, “We hire the school’s conference room for our periodic meetings. We meet once a month for an hour ordinarily. The group chose this conference room for three main reasons; first it was conveniently located, second it had a round table and third the hiring charges are absolutely low.”
She further added, “All of us sit around this round table. The advantage of a round table is that there is no one called the head of the table in the seating arrangement of a round table. All the people sitting around it get a level field to play.”
Kelly and Shaan met a group of some forty people in the school’s conference room.
All of them gave an impression of people with substance.
As they settled down, Kelly introduced Shaan to everyone in the group. Everyone welcomed him. Kelly addressed, “Shaan will reside in San Jose for quite some time now. I thought of bringing him here as my guest today. He needed some fellowship, as the poor guy was having no friends as yet. If he likes our group he is most welcome to join us as its permanent fixture. We can now start our tete-a-tete.”
Then the members of the group started sharing their experiences of past one month with each other. Each time a member spoke, Kelly gave his or her racial, religious, educational, professional and family background and country of origin to Shaan.
One of the members reported, “Our finances are in pretty healthy status now. Chairman of Kelly’s company is convinced that our work is benefiting the humanity on the whole and agreed to significantly enhance the allocation of funds to us from his company’s welfare foundation. I met him recently and thanked him for his generosity. I wish USA and the rest of the world had more companies like ‘Super soft Technologies’.”
On hearing this Kelly’s respect for her company shot up. Till now she was impressed with her company’s technological and business acumen. Now she could also see the human and ethical side of the company. She wished how nice it would be if more companies came forward.
A lady from the group took her turn and spoke, “Let me share my experience. Recently the justice department rang our group’s office. Before deciding on a divorce case the judge thought it wise to counsel the family by taking our assistance. The judge was aware of the existence of ‘Humanity Forum’. I took up this task and met the family consisting of husband, wife and their six-year-old child. It’s an inter-religion love marriage. Wife a Hindu and father a Muslim.”
She continued, “In the recent years the husband and the wife started fighting severely over the upbringing of their son. One issue among many was should he eat the food that is restricted in Hindu and Muslim religions. The boy goes to the school and has learnt to eat all kinds of food including all types of meat in the company of his various friends who come from different religious background. Both the parents feel offended when the boy eats the food restricted by their respective religions. The boy is happy eating every conceivable foodstuff. Wife blames husband and husband blames wife for not controlling the child’s affairs that are not in conformance with their individual religions. There are many such other issues too. I am counseling the parents. They see our points of views on these issues. I am in process of counseling. I am hopeful.”
Another member of the group spoke about a rescue operation he along with three of other members of the group carried out. He narrated, “All of you know about the recent fire where we rescued all the residents of some forty five condos. The residents were primarily low-income people with mixed racial and religious profile. No help came from any religious, social or governmental organizations since the residents did not have much influence over the concerned officials. We have arranged for their make shift shelter. We are also providing the food. Under our guidance the residents have pooled up some money to tide over the current crisis. We are in touch with the insurance company and soon the funds will come in to start the re-construction work.”
Another member said, “Two of us went to Seattle the other weekend. We assisted our Seattle group in their new project of providing medical help to those who were denied medicare cover by their employer companies. We are also in discussion with the insurance companies in this matter.”
Kelly gave some information to Shaan about the formation of such groups in the other cities of USA, “We were the forerunners in forming such a group in San Jose. Then some of our members spread the word to their like-minded friends in some other cities. Some people in the other cities on their own also took clue from us and initiated the work on our pattern. Now such groups have been formed in seven cities of USA whose objective is to work for humanity irrespective of race, religion, cast, creed, color, social or economic status.”
Shaan asked, “Do all the seven groups network with each other and work together?”
“The groups have earmarked the territories for their independent operations. Normally they work within their territories. However, on larger projects or international projects we pool up and work together. The groups have an effective and efficient communication link.”
“How do you manage your time? The group members must be full time professionals. How do they take leave from their jobs? It must be difficult.”
“In each group three to four members are core members who are full time workers of the group. They get their salaries from the group. Others like me use part of our holidays and vacation when we work for the group. We notify these dates to the group and the group calls on us on these dates as per the requirements.”
Some more members shared their experiences with the rest of the group.
One important point that was shared pertained to several incidents of coercive conversion of religions of people. In couple of nations the radicals amongst the majority religion people were forcing the minority religion people to change their religion. The governments of these countries were turning a blind eye to these incidents. ‘Humanity Forum’ was planning to tackle this issue soon as every person on the earth has a right to choose and follow his religion, faith and beliefs within the constitutional provisions of the countries. The forced conversions from one religion to other religion should be totally stopped everywhere in the world.
After about an hour, the meeting concluded. Everyone shook hands and dispersed.
Shaan and Kelly sat in Kelly’s car and they drove towards Shaan’s apartment. Shaan objected to it, “Kelly, let us to go to some decent restaurant instead. I do not wish to cook and I need some company for my dinner. Can I request you to be my company?”
This was the first time Shaan made such a request to Kelly.
Shelly was generous, she said, “I have no problem. I haven’t eaten out for quite some time. So I accept your invitation. Let me inform my mom and dad.”
Kelly called home from her cell. “Hey dad, how come you have mom’s cell?”
“She is in the kitchen. Her cell was lying here in the living room as usual. I will give it to her. Hang on.”
“Dad, listen. Don’t wait for me for the dinner. I will eat out. Now give to mom.”
Then she heard daddy saying, “Yin, Kelly wants to speak with you.”
As she heard a “hi” from her mother, she spoke, “You remember I had mentioned to you a guy….”
“Shaan?”
“Yes. He has invited me to join him for dinner. We are eating at ‘Greens’. So see you after dinner. Don’t wait for me. And you and dad should eat in time. Bye.”
Kelly loved her legal parents immensely as much as she had loved her real mom Christie.
“Enjoy yourself.”
“Thanks, Yin. Bye.”
“Bye.”
Kelly turned towards Shaan and chirped, “Come on, let us go.”
Shaan was pleased.
