As soon as she found her seat, she hauled her small suitcase on the overhead compartment, buckled her seatbelt and started to relax.
“Excuse me. That is my seat.”
She looked up and saw this Indian guy glowering at her.
But he didn’t know who he was dealing with.
“No, it is MY seat.”
“It is mine. The other aisle seat is your seat. You should move.”
Miss tough lady wouldn’t budge. “Why don’t you take that aisle seat. My luggage is already up there,” she said pointing above her.
Defeated, the Indian guy called the flight attendant.
Soon enough, Ms Tough Lady transferred to her side of the aisle.
“My luggage is there, please can you bring it down for me?” she asked Mr. Indian guy. “I will just hand it over when we get off the plane,” he said in disbelief at this woman’s condescending tone.
As the plane taxied on the runway of Changi airport on its way to India, the man and the woman, separated by a vacant seat, started talking. And they talked and talked. As the plane landed in India, they exchanged phone numbers.
She was there to meet her colleagues in Hyderabad. He was there to talk wedding plans.
He tried calling her a week after but couldn’t reach her somehow. It was only two months later, when she was back in Singapore that he finally got hold of her. He was, after all, working there as well. Not surprisingly, he called off the wedding. And yes, Miss Tough Lady’s heart, softened towards him.
It was no surprise that they fell in love. It was a relationship well on its way to a happy ending.
**
The first time she heard him say them, she wasn’t bothered. “Let us go to India then, to your village, so we can convince them that our relationship is for real,” she suggested to him confidently. He was unsure. His family was adamant that he marries A, the woman he had originally intended to marry. She lives in the same village where he grew up. His destiny was set with A.
The next time she heard the words, weeks later .. “My family will not agree to our union. It will be tough, impossible even.”
She threw in the towel. “What then, are we doing? If this going nowhere, we are wasting time. I need to be free.”
With much pain, she decided to end the relationship. It was her first relationship, a relationship she had hoped would be her lasting one. But she felt betrayed. And though it hurt so much, even though she wanted the relationship to work, she let him go, she ignored his pleas.
“Let us go to India, let us convince them then. Let us work it out please,” he tells where when he managed to call her over the phone.
But Miss woman in love, was after all, Ms tough lady.
“I don’t need this. I want the blessing of the people we love. I don’t understand why you tell me they will never approve of us but still want to be with me. What kind of future will we have? What if some other guy that was really meant for me is just out there, waiting for me to be free of you?”
He promised that it will work out.
“No,” she was firm. “You work out with your family. If God wants us to be together, He will work things out. I need not intervene. He will work out the circumstances. He will touch hardened hearts. I don’t need to do anything but stay still and pray.”
My eyes widened as my friend shared her story with me without shedding a tear.
“He broke my heart on Nov 21. Your wedding day,” she tells me. “I cried buckets of tears.”
I was speechless.
She continues, “ I didn’t speak to him for a month, but in December before Christmas, I decided to make peace with him.”
“He wants me back but I said I can only give him friendship. He told me I had a heart of stone. I said no I don’t. I just decided to let God work in my heart. He gave me peace.”
I had to tell her. “You have always been a strong lady.”
“Yes I am because God has given me hope and peace. I believe, truly believe that God loves me too much to let me stay in a situation where I will be shortchanged. I want so much to be in love and be married, but I am letting God handle everything.”
What else can I say? “I am really proud of how you handled the situation. May God reward your faith.”
“Yes He will.” she smiles back.















