A Fantastic Friend

I have a friend. Once he requested me to bring some books for his children from Delhi as these were not available in Chennai. I brought them. He wanted to pay for those books. They had cost about Rs.500/- He was after all my friend and the books were meant for small kids. So, I didn't want to take the money. I told him to let those books be my gift to them and refused to take the money. The next day he came to my house with about 25 meters of electrical cable meant for AC line and said that I should make electrical provision for fixing an AC in my children's bed room. He said that the cable was purchased for his own use but there was some excess and it was of no use to him.  I had no plan of buying AC for my home. So I told him I did not need the cable at all and asked him to take it back. But he left it at my home saying that I should use it whenever I purchased an AC.

After almost a year, I thought of buying an AC.  I showed the wire given by my friend to the electrician and asked him whether that could be used. He said that it could be used.  The wire was to be laid the following weekend. I casually mentioned it to the friend.  He seemed to have completely forgotten the cable.  The next day he came to my house and took back the cable saying that he would show it to his electrician and see whether it was fit. If it was fit, he would himself bring his electrician and lay it at my flat. He was gone with the cable.  He never met me nor talked to me on phone for sometime.  After a few weeks, he started calling me on phone and meeting me also. But there was no word about the cable.  Later, I came to know that he had used the cable for fixing an AC in his son's room.

It was indeed a strange experience to get something dumped on you when you don't need it at all and have it snatched from you when you find some use for it.