by Dr. C. Thomas Abraham
"It is in retrospect that events become significant", said T S Eliot. This is true of not only events, but persons also. Today, 15 years after my first meeting with Karl Kübel in Kotagiri village in the Nigiri hills of Tamil Nadu, I realise how thoroughly he changed the course of my life. In the first meeting he welcomed me as the prospective Director of KKID and shared his vision that it was not enough to make funds available for development projects. More important for him was the need to help people change their attitudes. That is why he wanted to found the Karl Kübel Institute for Development of Education. It happened to be my privilege to formulate that name, and Dr. Arickal came up with the appropriate acronym KKID."Karl was such a wonderful gift of God to humanity."
In the Kotagiri meeting Mary Anne added: "At Odenwald we have tried out TCI as a tool for attitudinal change. We would like to familiarise you with it." What followed was a half day introduction to TCI. One session was a TRUST WALK. Swami Sachidananda was Karl's partner in this exercise. In the plenary session Mary Anne asked us: "How did you feel?" Swamiji said: "I feel relieved because I was aware that I was carrying a precious treasure in my hands. I have now unloaded safely the treasure!"
Millions of people in India today know the value of this treasure. Karl was such a wonderful gift of God to humanity. And his greatness consists not in the funds he made available to KKS, but in the immense personal sacrifice behind it.
"Karl was a man of few words"
For me and for thousands of development workers in India and Maldives, today TCI has proved itself to be another gift that accompanied Karl into this country. I am writing this note on the eve of the 9th National Conference of RCI India, the organisation which is dedicated to the cause of promoting TCI in India. But for Karl and KKS, TCI would not have entered India. It is a strange paradox of balance sheets that the real assets go unaccounted and unaudited. TCI is one such asset.
Karl was a man of few words, at least at the stage of life when I met him. But what he spoke were pearls. If pearls were as plenty as pebbles who would have stooped to pick them up! We picked up every word he spoke. It came to us translated by Mary Anne, or Dr. Arickal or Ingeborg. Once at while Karl was in queue waiting to check in at the Coimbatore airport, three years before KKID was established, he said: "How good it is that we are here! Let us build two shelters here. One in the south, and the other in the north." Karl's vision of personal and social transformation was nothing short of Transfiguration!
There are people who make things happen. There are people who witness things happening. And there are people who don't do either of these. They stand apart and wonder "What happened?" Karl belonged to the first category. He did make things happen. He could dream big and ask "Why not?" This is what remains imprinted in my mind as I look back on Karl.
