Two Kind and Generous Hearts

In 1981, during my first visit to see Sri Chinmoy, Arpan, a New York student of Sri Chinmoy, invited me to run three 2-mile races with him on the following Saturday - organized by the Sri Chinmoy Marathon Team and to be held in separate locations around greater New York City.

Early that Saturday we drove to the first 2-mile race, which was to start at 8:00 am. It was a cold November morning with an icy wind blowing - the sort of day when you have to brace yourself just to get out of the car.

The race was 2 laps around a roadway within a suburban park. The sky was dark grey and because it was late autumn the trees had already lost their leaves.

But in spite of the bleak weather I felt ecstatically happy, as I had just spent the best week of my life in the loving company of Sri Chinmoy and his amazing students.

We quickly took off our warm tracksuits; sprinted from the car to the start line and eagerly started the race just to stay warm. Arpan ran about 11:06 and my time was 11:37. As we finished there was a brief award ceremony, and because there were less than 20 runners we both received place-getter medals.

Afterwards Arpan took me for a scrumptious breakfast at a restaurant run by students of sri Chinmoy in New York's Greenwich Village. At breakfast he said that we could either go and run the second 2-miler or we could visit Sandhani, another New Yorker, and help him shift some boxes of running shoes. I had run quite hard and was starting to feel a little sore and tired so this immediately became a much more attractive option.

We helped Sandhani move boxes of shoes for an hour or two and then he very kindly gave me 2 brand new pairs of running shoes including a pair of Nike Elite racing shoes. He said to me …

"You will run a faster 2-mile time this afternoon in these!"

I was touched by his spontaneous, understated generosity.

Sandani was right, and even though I was a bit tight and lactic from the morning race, I did run a faster time that afternoon.

Towards the end of the afternoon race I sensed that Arpan, who had been almost 100 metres ahead of me, seemed to be getting a little closer. But, although I pushed as hard as I could, I was unable to close the gap and I finished in 11:33. Arpan's time was about 11:17

At the finish line Arpan said to me …

"You did not catch me. I slowed a little so that you might catch me!"

I soon realized that Arpan was actually a far superior runner. A week latter he drove me 150 kilometres across Long Island and we ran the Long Island Road Runners Marathon. Arpan did a personal best 2:49:50 to my 3:37:00 ... his time of 2:49:50 qualifying him for entry in the 1982 Boston Marathon by just 10 seconds.

So, I was continuously moved by his kindness, brotherly concern and humility.