Meeting Guru Nanak

My grandmother once returned from ‘Aashirwaad’ (the senior citizen’s club) and told us about an old Punjabi woman …Parmindar Kaur. Apparently she was a new member of the club. My grandmother was extremely excited because she had just heard Parminder Kaur’s ‘real life story’. This was her story:

Paraminder Kaur was only 15 years old when she was married into a large Punjabi household. Her husband was the eldest among the 10 brothers and sisters.

Immediately after her wedding she was introduced to the kitchen work. In the beginning her mother-in–law and sisters –in-law guided her through the process. But soon, the baton was quietly passed on to her.

Thus, began Parminder’s struggle to serve a hungry family of 10 young members, a quiet father-in-law and a demanding mother-in-law. They all liked their rotis served hot with a layer of ghee on top. The loud demands for the second and third helpings made her nervous. Soon, began a shower of verbal abuses on her; mainly by her mother-in-law and sisters-in-law. She was accused of being inefficient and incompetent. Her husband never interfered.

One day when the verbal abuses turned physical, Parminder decided that she would not tolerate any more and declared that she would leave home. This brought only a sarcastic smile from her mother-in-law.

That night Parminder wept and packed her belongings into her small bag. At the crack of dawn she took her bag and quietly went towards the back door and was dumbstruck!

There in front of her stood a tall man with a white beard. He wore white and immaculate clothes. There was an aura about him and, he held a long stick. Parminder stared at this huge figure for a few seconds…awestruck. She ran towards the front door to find the same man right in front of her. Parminder was shocked. She went back into her room.

The next day saw Parminder working in the kitchen. Her mother-in-law just said, “I thought you were gone!” followed by a wicked laugh.

That evening while rolling out the chapattis, Parminder quietly narrated her experiences of the morning. There was a sudden silence in the dinning room.

Parminder’s father-in-law, who had been listening to the narration all this while, called her , held her hands and said, “puttar, please don’t go! It was Guruji whom you saw this morning….he tried to stop you! Tell me what you want …anything…but please don’t go!”

“A bigger tawa”, said Parminder.