A journey to Switzerland and beyond!

The year was 1986, when I went first time to Switzerland. It was purely a personal trip.

My Nairobi neighbor Ramesh Patel had a travel firm in the complex of Sheraton Hotel, Nairobi. We used to discuss my travel plans in the evening almost daily as he lived alone. Ramesh, unfortunately lost his wife when she delivered his third child. His first two were teenagers who were studying in London and his new born was taken in by his sister in Canada, who had only two sons. He was very close to me and a British citizen. When an engagement ceremony was conducted at Nairobi, I still remember offering my flat to him to accommodate his relatives visiting from Canada, UK and India. From then onwards, we became very close and he always helped arrange all my travel documents. He even went to the extent of organising all other facilities like my special vegetarian food on flights, ensuring the best seat allocation and so on. He booked my triangular tickets from Nairobi to Bombay via London. He arranged my ticket and onward Zurich return ticket from London, which used to be very economical if bought in local currency. He made all the arrangements through his daughter, who was studying in London.

I remember well, this young beautiful girl who arrived in her red Mazda sports car to pick me up from Heathrow airport and dropped me at his brother, Jay’s bungalow in a posh locality, a few kilometers away. I have been informed that he was the person who set up the first super market in London. His house was a magnificent one with a beautiful lawn and garden facing the front room. They provided all faciltiies for my comfort as I knew him from the time he came to Nairobi for the engagement ceremony. In London, during summers, the sun rises as early as 4.30 AM and sets at around 9 PM.Being new to this time zone, I woke up the following day at sunrise as usual with the streaming sunlight on my face . . . although it was only 4.30 in the morning. After I heard sounds of the hosts pottering about, I came to the drawing room and spotted the lady of the house having her coffee. They told me that I could make mine from the self-cooking kitchen, where everything including bread was available. And then i saw the husband walk in and prepare his own coffee too. This was a new brand experience to me, because at our house, my wife used to bring me ready tea/coffee in the morning, especially when a guest was present. Although their ancestors came from India and their food habits weere Guajarati Indian type, they lived quite ike the British. Soon enough I saw a white lady arrive for cleaning and washing the utensils and it was then quite a strange sight to me. That image somehow reminded me of how we were treated when the British ruled India. It just seemed symbolic to me as it was such a novel sight for me seeing a white person employed by an Indian. Today, ofcourse, having travelled the world, we are used to both Indians and all races and communities working alongside but the power equation was indeed very different those days.

After breakfast, I decided to go to the famous Marks & Spencers. Being new to the city, they requested their sweet and bubbly son to accompany me. He held onto me in the crowded store, guiding me as we navigated the various floors of the popular and iconic store. I still recall how the boy spotted an item of his interest and asked me to purchase it for him with a humble request not to tell his ‘mummy’ about it. I was a bit worried because I did not have enough cash to buy that toy costing about 150 pounds. There was no Credit/Debit cards those days.   I had a cheque, which I took from my friend in case of any eventuality. I went to cash it from the Barclays Bank close by. I reached the first floor, where the Bank was situated and was rather surprised to see no one around there. Catching me standing by myself, a lady official came and took the cheque from me. She asked me what denomination was needed and gave the cash to me immediately. Had it been in Kenya or India, it would have taken at least 30 minutes after standing in a queue. I was really delighted to see the level of service and the efficiency the bank provided to customers. The boy was really happy in getting what he wanted. I still don’t know whether I did the right thing; but I did not inform his parents. and remains a secret to this date..

 I was very upset with the Indian Bank though, when I asked to transfer some money to my account. My Bank refused to accede to my request saying that month’s quota was over due to the restrictions from RBI at that time. There I was, stuck in another country, an incredibly disappointing and frustrating experience I must confess! I could not understand the logic of receiving money from my own account due to this policy.  Also I found it difficult to change from Kenyan shillings to British pounds to German and Swiss currencies. These days because of international credit/debit cards and the combined European currency, it is easy to travel abroad. During travels, every night my job was to calculate and count the coins and currencies, which all looked similar to my untrained eye. In this process, I used to lose a lot of money because of the exchange variation. However, those coins total amounted to a fairly decent figure and they were often given to coin collection centers at increased rates, which really helped me .

Next evening I flew to Zurich from London. My brothers in law Krishnan Padiyath with his German wife Annemarie (Indian name Ammini given by Swami Chinmayanada) were at the airport to receive me. On meeting them, he first asked me to show my ticket and he found the ticket was of the previous day. Being a very disciplined and strict gentleman, he was very annoyed with me and questioned how I travelled from London to Zurich with that. Only then I realized my stupidity in fighting with the Swiss air staff for allotting my reserved seat to another person, that too someone who had travelled all the way from Hong Kong. They also overlooked the date and shifted that passenger to another seat and assigned the same to me. I was very guilty in my action, which I realized rather late. I checked my itinerary and finally admitted my mistake to my brother in law. Although Krishnan Padiyath followed my itinerary strictly, he did not mention it the previous day when I called him from London. When I asked him about it, he told me that if informed earlier, I would get worried while I am in another country. I really appreciated him, for his thoughtful action.. 

My stay at Switzerland was such a pleasant one as his flat was conveniently located at Wettingen, near the Railway station. He was always a man of peace and led a contented spiritual life in that beautiful country, which really impressed me. I was very touched by the hospitality shown by his wife, and was inspired by her knowledge of Hindu scriptures and the Vedanta way of life. After almost 20 years of their stay in Switzerland, they opted to shift to India – the land of spirituality. Incidentally, Swami Chinmayananda attracted them and they contributed a lot to the Chinmaya mission work in Europe. I would give credit for my encounter with Chinmaya Mission to Krishnan Padiyath, as he introduced me to Swami Chinmayandaji, when he visited Nairobi for the first time. My eldest brother was attending Swamiji’s marathon lectures on the Bhagwad Gita at Cross Maidan, Bombay though I wasn’t particularly fond of attending it with him. At that time, I felt it was not intended for a college boy and I would rather study it and process it better when I grew old and retired from professional life. Now of course, many decades later, I understand and have woken up to the fact that had I attended those lectures at that time, I would have been able to do my duties in life as a better person!

My first trip to Switzerland was a memorable one and has gifted me thoughts to pursue in my retired years and shown me the path of consciousness. As Chinmayanand guides and I quote “Spirituality is neither the privilege of the poor nor the luxury of the rich. It is the choice of a wise man”.

Travel does broaden the mind as is said. Atleast…it did mine.