I Was Blessed by a Transgender Woman today

I was on my way to Bangalore from Chennai (both are places in India) with my family, in my dad’s car. It was my grandfather’s 80th birthday, and we were returning from a family get together, including the extended family (about 25 people in total).

Our intense schedules from the past few days had completely drained us out. About halfway to Bangalore, my father requested for coffee to refresh himself and stretch legs. Thus, we ended up parking our car on the side of the road for a well-deserved break. That is when the transgender woman approached us. She was beautiful and had an elegance I could not describe even if I wanted to.

We assumed she was approaching us to beg for money since seeing transgenders begging on roads, is very common in India. Why that happens, and why it should not be happening is for another article altogether. But, my mother immediately pulled out cash from her wallet and gave it to her. We expected her to leave after taking the cash, but something unexpected happened.

She started to bless each of us and performed the ritual to ward off the evil eye (suthi podurathu (Tamil)/ Nazar hatana (Hindi)). She spent about 1 to 2 minutes on each of us, blessing us for a fulfilling life. With a beautiful smile on her face. She never asked for anything more, and after performing the ritual, she left. Without looking back. In seconds.

While that may seem creepy for a lot of people reading the article, it is not uncommon in India for the person to bless you, if you provide anything of value to the poor. But usually, even the blessing comes with a cost. The more you give, the more blessings you receive. For me, this situation was different, because she did not ask for anything more. And her only focus was blessing us. To bring a smile on our face.

It was one of the situations in my life, where I asked myself, “What just happened?”. In a world full of negativity, one woman had the power to instill such positive thoughts in me.

Have you ever had someone to bless you? To tell you that whatever you wish in life will come true? It could also be a stranger, and probably their words might or might not work. But the inner peace it brings you is tremendous.

Transgender women play an important part in Hindu Traditions. Their blessings are considered to be auspicious. In many families, they are also invited in the family functions such as marriages to bless the couple, and baby showers to bless the babies.

I saw it as an omen for good things to come. It was the first time I was feeling so positive in days. I felt like, I could achieve anything and everything if I tried now. And that was the most important thing to me. My parents were also afraid whether she was a con woman or not. But even if she was, I would not have held it against her.

Because of the peace, she gave me, when I felt things in my life were going wrong. When I felt low, she gave me the strength to look up again. And that was what mattered.

That was also the point when I started thinking about the effect we humans have on each other, as a community. Why do we spread so much hatred, when we are capable of spreading so much love? And that was the instance when I decided to spread positivity in every way I can, for the next year and the years after.

We live in a world of extreme negativity. So much that, even bringing happiness and smiles on others faces needs to be a conscious decision But I made that decision today. Can you?

Originally published here