Jackoo was a mediocre boy from a family of eight children.  A great daydreamer was he who never paid attention to his schoolwork.  Parental guidance was limited to moral values only.  Schoolteachers were more interested in brighter students and left many scholars like Jackoo neglected.  Illiteracy in the family added more burdens on the little boy.  The adults as well as the young called him “Dom kop.” A word normally used for a stupid.  Being the underdog of the family it was always his turn to shine the shoes of his brothers, wash the dishes and help Mommy with the household chores.

 

Sad was he, but he had a very happy and entertaining nature.  To be happy he always pretended to be someone great.  One of his greatest pretensions was to be an Engineer.  Jackoo took a hammer and a few spanners, hung it around his torn trousers and walked around pretending to be an Engineering Artesian.  A student always at the bottom of the class and neglected, was never to see a dream come true.  His teachers had no hopes for him or the future as he failed most of the prime years.  Jackoo a nine-year-old boy had no destiny.

 

In the community where he lived, education played a very important role.  Many children were going overseas to be educated and to learn more of their culture.  Jackoo’s father was an uneducated man and on the advice of other elders of the community he decided to send Jackoo and his brother with the others.

 

While escaping the life at home, he was prepared to go out and find a new experience in the big wide world.  The journey was thirty days sailing at sea.  During this long journey Jackoo's young mind decided to work hard.  He started to long for his parents.  He remembered his mother calling him “Jackoo,” a nickname of love for him only.  He remembered his father’s words, “Son, Reading stimulates the intellect and writing inspires one to be an author.”

 

 On the deck of the ship sitting on an empty bench, Jackoo made up his mind.  He prepared his mind for the long journey ahead.  He had brought with him one big book to read.  Inspired by his father’s words he started to read the book.  He read the book twice without comprehending or understanding a word.  “What is wrong with me?” he said to himself.  “No wonder people called me Dom kop!”  Just then, with a sudden wave of encouraging thought, he said to himself, “Bingo, I found my problem. I am not able to comprehend what I read so how can I write well?”  Looking at the rising sun, the tossing waves and the freshening winds, days went by even faster.

 

On reaching his boarding school at a very tender age he planned his strategy.  Firstly to learn how to read, write and comprehend.  He had realized from his father that at school one is taught how to read and write.  The first year was exciting, meeting new friends.  The boarding school was a bigger change in his life to keep the spirits of learning high.  Adjusting to a new life in a new hostile country was not easy at all. Improving on study techniques, Jackoo was finding a footing and wrote his final exams for the year.

 

It was summer holidays and a distant relative picked them up to take them to a small village.  Jackoo was anxiously waiting for the exam results.  The village postman brought the mail.  All the scholars got their results and were happily smiling and celebrating their success.  Jackoo did not get his results.

 

 Slowly the excitement was turning into a torture.  Just then, while enquiring his results a villager said, “It is a norm that if you did not get your results, you must have failed” 

Jackoo was devastated.  With a lump in his throat, eyes full of tears and shaken to his limbs, he started to walk away.  Dragging his once excited legs now barely wanted to go forward.  He said to himself, “Oh God, what has happened.  I am good for nothing.

 

With no parents to console him and left in the ruthless world, the sadness started to torture his growing mind.  There was no one to comfort his sorrows.  Still aimlessly walking, he remembered his childhood prayers to God.  He was passing a small temple.  He went inside, bowed down on the floor and told God, “I had promised to work hard and so I did.  You did not help me.    My only faith was in you.” With big tears rolling down his big round red cheeks, Jackoo was back on a road to nowhere.

 

 Just then a passing saintly man in his religious attire stopped him and said, “Son don’t look so worried. Down the street corner go and buy yourself a rosary with one hundred and eight beads and chant this sacred mantra every day before you sleep.  All your problems will be over”.   Jackoo was surprised and shocked at the stranger giving him advice.  A mystic thought blew his mind apart.  Who was this saintly man?  Still with a lump in his throat, tears filled his big black eyes; he went and bought the rosary.  His actions were now just robotic as if someone possessed him.

 

 Night fell and in the summer heat, sleep was disturbed.  Jackoo revised his whole life.  He felt the only door he had was now shut on him.  Somehow he has to find a window.  Consoling himself chanting the mantra with the help of a rosary he fell off to sleep.  With the rising sun he decided to give another attempt at school.  The remaining holidays passed on slowly, reading and writing.  Once the joy of childhood was now gone.

 

 

Traveling a whole day, he was back at the boarding school.  Failure now started to hurt him.  All thoughts of pleasure, happiness and excitement had disappeared from his enthusiastic mind.  The mind was vacant and wanted to undo the past for a better future.

  With many parents and guardians gathering at the gates of the school, Jackoo was also there, but trying to avoid his old classmates.  Then suddenly one of them ran to him and with great excitement said, “Jackoo we will be together again this coming year.  My dad said that you are also promoted to the next class.”  Disbelieved at first, failure does not allow the mind to prepare for success.

 

 Many thoughts ran amok in Jackoo’s mind.  There must be a mistake.  Then slowly the confused mind of this devastated young boy was getting somewhere.  He put all energies into his speech and said to his friend, “How does your dad know that I am promoted to the next class?”  The friend promptly replied and said, “Go register and you will see for yourself.”  Running away with excitement, he went to his mother.

 

 Many doubts still remained with Jackoo, but when he registered for the year he knew for certain that he was in the next class. His role number had changed and the previous year’s result was not reflected in his new file.  Jackoo was just coming to grips with reality and facts when another negative thought started to create havoc.  What if all this is just a big mistake and when they find out I will be in the old class.

 

 Unknowingly Jackoo already created faith in chanting his mantras and on that faithful night something told him that his prayer was answered.  God did help him. He asked the Lord to be his friend for he was the one who knew the truth.

 

 Accompanied by a great friendship, Jackoo has to now keep his promise and work hard.

Coming years started to roll fast. He changed from a mediocre student to a bright young teenager.  The competition with the clever students was his first show of strength.  Later he attended one of the best engineering institutes in the country and graduated as a Mechanical Engineer.

 

 He took time to learn from every experience he had.  The studies in Engineering taught him to solve problems.  Today very convincingly, he says, “For every problem there are many solutions, if one does not work, try the other.”  Jackoo is a successful entrepreneur.  When asked for the secret of his success, he humbly replied, “Hardship and failures must never be deterrents. It brings you closer to that almighty Lord within you.”