17

My grandmother pressed the worn copy of Avvaiyar's verses into my hands before we left Chennai. Seventeen years later, holding it in my Toronto apartment, I finally understood why. Through PaybookClub, I discovered other Tamil diaspora members treasured the same texts. We gathered monthly, our voices blending across continents as we read ancient wisdom aloud. The poems my amma quoted now resonated differently—not as obligations, but as bridges. That ragged book became sacred, its margins filled with my notes and theirs. We were scattered across oceans, yet somehow closer than ever. In sharing these stories, we found ourselves.