Highly Commended Story - Epiphany of Riya

“Epiphany of Riya” by Shri Varsha, SRak’s Pallikkoodam, India, is the Highly Commended story in the sub-junior category of the first biannual Short Story Contest 2019.

Varsha is a grade 3 student at Rak's Pallikkoodam, Coimbatore, India. She lives with her parents and her grandmother. Her sister, who is in grade 5 also studies in the same school. Most of her evenings are spent with her pet dog, Tuffy. Varsha loves playing badminton and hopes to become a badminton player in the future. Her other interests include playing soccer and painting.

Epiphany of Riya

Once upon a time there lived a girl named Riya. She was like a princess for her family and had a very luxurious lifestyle. She had everything in abundance, be it toys, dress or games and never realized the value of money. She wasted time, money, resources and almost everything. She always used to complain about not having the latest toy or dress. Anytime of her meal she demands for a variety of dishes but will end up eating only a little and waste the remaining food. Her profligate nature worried her parents a lot, but Riya always turned a deaf ear to their piece of advice. It was her birthday and her father presented a beautiful cycle, but she complained that it doesn’t show her status and demanded for a state-of-the-art Google Cycle. Riya’s father felt very bad about her pride, but moved away in silence.

One day Riya’s school took the students for a field trip to an orphanage. There Riya saw kids, who were without their parents. They couldn’t even afford to have a proper dress. It was a real eye-opener experience for Riya, which taught her many life lessons. She then spoke to the warden and came to know that those orphans sometime go without food on the days when nobody donate things to the orphanage. Each child there were doing their own work, like cleaning up the space, setting their beds, washing their own clothes and many more which Riya could hardly imagine. For Riya everything would be set ready by her parents the household chores were done by her mother with the help of the maids. Her dad manages the business and runs the family financially keeping them active. Riya hasn’t undergone any such situations like starving for food, being without her father or mother or even doing things on her own like washing the clothes or cleaning the room etc… Riya felt very sad after seeing the struggles of those orphans to meet their basic needs and so she donated many items like dress, toys, food etc. She was recollecting how she used to demand for things to her parents and trouble them. She also learnt the value of parents when she saw the orphans. So from that time she didn’t waste any food. She became altruistic and shared everything to everyone and never demanded things from her parents. She requested her parents to donate something for the orphanage every month. She even requested her parents to celebrate her birthday with the orphans in the orphanage and that she doesn’t want a grand party rather she wanted a good meal for the orphans there. She was happy with what she had. Her parents were happy for the change in Riya. Charity begins from home. Through Riya we can see that charity is true virtue it enhances our character and groom us as an better individual.

Moral: Do not waste things. Service to humanity is service to God.