The Professor on the Bike!

This evening, I took an Ola bike ride 🛵to meet two of my batchmates at a spot about 8 kilometers from my place in Bhubaneswar.

The rider, an elderly man well past 65, turned out to be a retired Mechanical Engineering🔧 professor.

During the ride, he shared memories of his childhood, which he spent in Jamshedpur, the well-known Tatanagar, roughly 400 kilometers from Bhubaneswar.

Being curious, I asked him about the city. He smiled and told me how much it had changed and grown since his school days.

He mentioned that he grew up in a colony where families from different 🌏cultural backgrounds and states lived.

This gave him the chance to learn several languages, including Bengali and Bhojpuri, in addition to Odia.

Surprisingly, his reason for riding Ola at this age isn't out of financial necessity or to make ends meet. He’s fit, financially secure, with a steady income from pensions and house rents.

The real reason he takes these rides is to engage in conversations💬with people and make the most of his retirement days.

For nearly 30 minutes⏳, I enjoyed listening to his fascinating stories and life experiences.

It struck me that life truly unfolds in these small, fleeting moments—meeting people we may never see again, yet they leave a lasting impression, filling us with a sense of wonder.

If this isn’t ✨magic, then what else is!