Good Samaritan

The other day we were talking about Good Samaritans and I remembered this story from a few years back.
My older child was only about two years old. Hubby joined us at my parents’ place (in a different city than where we used to live) after a long trip abroad. We were returning to our own home together. We took a flight out to New Delhi and had to catch another flight from there to get back home. We all had confirmed tickets on the same flight. But when we got to the check in counter, guess what? Hubby’s ticket was not valid. Computer malfunction? Probably....
Anyways, the guy at the counter would not hear a thing. He said hubby just had to buy a new ticket in order to travel that particular flight. Well, the price of the ticket in those days was 6,000 rupees, no small price by any standards, not then, not now. We didn’t carry that much cash and believe it or not, we didn’t have a credit card. (Not many people did back then.) Being as it was really early in the morning, banks were not open and the domestic airport did not have a travel exchange office. We just had travelers checks and international currency. My son was clinging to his dad and that ruled out the possibility of my traveling with him and hubby following us later after sorting out the ticket problem. We could all just take a different flight, but that meant giving up our two good tickets. We were stranded at the airport with 30 minutes to go before the flight took off.
As we were debating about what to do, this guy tapped hubby on the shoulder and handed him 10,000 rupees. “Buy your ticket and take your family home,” he said! As our jaws were still hanging open, he disappeared into the crowd. It took us a few minutes to understand what was going on. First things first, we bought the ticket and then went running to find the good man. After much searching, we spotted him, thanked him profusely, and asked for his home address so we could mail the money back to him. He seemed totally cool and said he did not expect the money back! But, of course, we insisted and after much persuasion, he gave us his home address.
To this day, I do not know his name. But I do remember his face clearly. His act of generosity towards total strangers woke us up to the fact that the world is not such a bad place after all! There are good people out there.
It is almost 10 years since this incident and I hope that person, wherever he is, knows how thankful we are for his timely help..