Divine Hand

In mid-January, after my trip to Ukraine and Estonia, I found myself on my way to Moscow—a 17-hour train ride. The plan, as discussed with Lotika, was that I would fly from Moscow to Siberia to visit the Tomsk Centre, since no one from there had ever had the opportunity to visit New York. I was excited about experiencing the very cold weather of this fabled region. On a very antiquated small plane, I departed for Siberia late in the evening, wearing several layers of clothes because I had been warned about the cold. It was still dark when we landed around 6 a.m. After disembarking, I was looking over the small sea of faces for one that glowed, but I could not see anyone who looked like a disciple. Most of the people were taxi drivers with cigarettes clenched between their teeth. I followed the people who were heading into a small airport building, but it was just as cold inside as it was outside. I saw no signs for the baggage area, so I asked the first person I saw, an oriental man. I inquired if he understood English, and he answered in a very fine accent, almost New Yorkese, "Yes, what do you need?" I told him I was wondering where we claim our baggage, and he said to follow him, since he was going there also. My baggage arrived, but there was still no disciple in sight to help me. I decided I would just wait there, and I was sure that someone would come to get me. On my whole trip, there had always been a good network of disciples to take care of me, thanks to Lotika. Everyone left, and the only people who remained were this oriental man and his cigarette-smoking taxi driver. He came over and asked if he could help me, but I explained that I would be all right, that my friends were sure to come soon. He offered to make a phone call for me, to see what had happened, but when I gave him Lotika's number in Moscow, he discovered that the phone does not call outside of Tomsk. "I cannot leave you in the airport," he told me, "because you will freeze to death. This I cannot allow." "Oh, I'll be all right," I replied. But after some discussion in Russian with his driver, he proposed to take me to his house and call Lotika from there. I felt perfectly at ease with this plan, since I knew that the Supreme was taking care of me. On the way to his home, he pointed out some of the historical buildings, and I was surprised at how modern this town was, and so civilised. I somehow had envisioned that Siberia was one vast snow-covered mountain. After a 30-minute drive, we arrived at his apartment and met his ten-year-old son and his very pretty wife. She was getting ready to leave for work, but took the time to prepare breakfast for me. My rescuer, Slava Lee, called Lotika, who gave him three other numbers to call, and soon a disciple also named Slava said he would come to get me. Within twenty minutes he arrived—a tall boy who spoke English very well and was one of the leaders of the Tomsk Centre. It turned out that the disciple who was supposed to pick me up had an accident on the way to the airport, but fortunately no one was hurt. I was very grateful to the Supreme for sending my rescuer. I would have frozen to death in that empty, unheated airport building, where it was 35 degrees below zero and hardly anyone spoke English. The people in the Tomsk Centre were thrilled that I had made the effort to visit them in the dead of winter. But I shall never forget that other Slava, who was guided by a Divine Hand.

Snehashila (New York)