I am yet to narrate the “how I met your father” story to my young kids, but I look forward to it. Ours was an unusual meeting and, in a world dominated by talk of AI, a nice reminder of human connection.
In 2008, yellow minivans, operated by a company called Fancy Bus – although not fancy in any way – would ferry office-goers across different parts of Dubai. I met Karthik on one such cramped, slightly smelly vehicle that did the run between Bur Dubai and Dubai Media City.
A Tamilian like me, he was living on his own in Dubai. What started as requests to hold the bus if I was running a few minutes late, developed into longer conversations during bumpy rides.
We discovered shared interests such as music and photography, our friendship progressed, and after we both relocated to India, we got married in 2011.
But my tryst with Dubai’s transport system did not end there. After our wedding, Karthik was offered a job in Dubai and we returned to the UAE. Not long afterwards, I was back on the job market. But, despite job hunting extensively and reaching out to old contacts, I got nowhere.
About a month in, I was travelling on the Dubai Metro, when I overheard the person next to me, who was on the phone, give out her email address, which ended with the name of a big publishing company in Dubai. After she hung up, I first apologised for eavesdropping, then told her I was looking for a job as a business journalist.
She was super-kind and, despite having joined the company only a week prior, she passed on the details of the relevant editor. I thanked her, reached out to them and got a job with the publication – where I spent 10 years.
I know it sounds too good to be true, but serendipity is real, and conversations can lead to unexpected endings.
And sometimes, they serve as life’s little nudges.
Habituated to chatting with taxi drivers in Dubai, I find that most invariably grumble about the difficulty they face living far away from family, especially during challenging economic times. The one conversation I most vividly remember, though, was with a taxi driver with a bright smile, exuding optimism. His secret? He was extremely content, telling me he was grateful for whatever he made and the simple fact he had a job. It is a lesson I frequently go back to, when dealing with adversity.
In August, during a visit home to Bengaluru, I was urged by my father to meet a driver who occasionally chauffeured my parents around town. At first, my sister and I wondered why we were being pulled away to meet a stranger. But once he began speaking, his stories stayed with us. He told us how his family had defied tradition for love, how he served in the military and was even imprisoned, and how his later work in private security and chauffeuring has taken him around the world.
It was a striking reminder that every person has a story, which we often miss unless we take the time to ask. And we only heard his because my father had struck up a conversation during a car ride.
In recent years, whenever I travel by public trains – whether in the UAE or outside the country – I often look around to find most people buried in their phones. Don’t get me wrong, I’m often guilty of the same. But imagine the stories we would hear if we started speaking to the people next to us.
And, who knows, one of them might also turn out to be a life partner?
