A decade or two ago, Valentine’s Day was all about roses, Dairy Milk, and a greeting card with cliché lines. These cards were often slipped into books or delivered in person, but always with a best friend hovering for moral support. While some of these gestures dared to begin new love stories, others reaffirmed promises already made. Tamil cinema, too, for the longest time, mirrored these rituals, turning roses and Archie’s card confessions into expressions of love for an entire generation.
Valentine’s Day is still synonymous with flowers, chocolates, and cards, and it revolves around a gamble — a confession that will either be accepted or rejected.
Once, these acceptances, surprised smiles, and awkward refusals belonged to the two people involved. But today, there is a third presence. This person now faces rejection on behalf of another, sneaks past apartment gates and park watchmen for someone else, and meets blushing faces meant for a different name. This is the modern-day Cupid, who, remains invisible in these love stories. And we call them delivery agents or, colloquially, delivery annas and akkas.
Ahead of Valentine’s Day, the companies they work for turned into bustling warehouses of love, stocking everything from roses and chocolates to electronics. So these delivery personnel recall moving in and out of these hubs in the week that led to V-day, and especially on February 14, when orders reportedly surged from midnight. Along their way, they collected anecdotes and admitted to carrying more excitement than exhaustion, describing it as a day like no other.
Couriers of love
Ganesan, a delivery agent, said, “Usually, when people place orders, they never wait at the gate or come downstairs to collect it. But this Valentine’s Day, I delivered ten packages of roses and flowers to different people, and all of them were ready to collect them at the gate or at their door.” The promptness, he added, was not out of consideration for his long hours, but caution because the receivers did not want their families to discover that a lover had sent them something. The senior citizen, still tirelessly working to make ends meet, laughed as he added, “It definitely made my day a little easier.”
Shakthi Vel, another delivery agent, said his deliveries unfolded differently. For all the eight deliveries he made that day, there were clear instructions such as ‘don’t ring the bell,’ ‘leave it outside the gate,’ ‘wait near the neighbouring park’s entrance,’ and so on. “One of them even requested discrete packaging and called me to say that the delivery was for his girlfriend, who resided in a girls’ hostel, and that the warden would inform her parents if she grew suspicious. I delivered without being seen by the warden. The girl even tipped me `50,” he beamed.
Shakthi also went the extra mile for a young couple this season. “One boy had sent a love letter over WhatsApp to me and requested that it be printed and delivered along with the gifts. The app has that provision, but the boy didn’t know. So I went to a print shop, got the letter printed, put it in with the package, and delivered it,” he chuckled and added with a hint of envy, “We never loved like this in our time. These 2K kids are truly enjoying their moment.”
While many deliveries ended well, a few turned unintentionally comic. Shivani, Shakthi’s colleague, called her first gift delivery on this Valentine’s Day “a surprise that failed”.
A husband, away at work, had arranged for flowers and chocolates to be sent home to his wife. In the rush, he forgot to switch the payment mode from cash on delivery to online. When Shivani arrived, the puzzled wife insisted she had not ordered anything and called her husband to check. Happily surprised by his gesture, she accepted the gift and proceeded to close the door when Shivani stopped her and asked for payment. “It was hilarious. That lady called her husband while taking out money from her purse and said, ‘Idhuku neenga surprise pannamale irundhurkalam’ (You needn’t have surprised me at all!),” she narrated, adding how it made her think of the joke, “Idhuku paruthi moota godown laye irundhurkalam”, from the movie Kalakalappu.
Amid the cheerful and comic moments, there were difficult ones, too. Venkatesh, a warehouse manager, recalled how one of his delivery partners found himself in an uncomfortable situation while handing over a proposal, packed with a greeting card and gifts. The recipient, a young woman, refused to accept it, and what should have been a simple drop-and-leave turned tense for the delivery agent. “Though he was only dropping off a parcel, he had to face a very angry receiver. The delivery partner maintained his calm. He eventually contacted the sender, explained the situation, informed us of the issue, and the order was cancelled. We refunded the money, too,” Venkatesh said.
Back to reality
But even as they carried roses and confessions across the city, some returned home to ordinary nights. After a day spent witnessing love and joy, the silence at the end of their shift felt unusually heavy for many. For Ganesan, it wasn’t easy. “My wife passed away a few years back. When she was around, I used to give her a rose for Valentine’s,” he softly said, as tears welled up.
On the other hand, younger delivery partners who are single admitted that the day made them think about the absence of a romantic relationship more than usual. Surrounded by gifts all day, the longing, they said, felt a little sharper and the question of “maybe next year” lingered for a while in their minds.
Setting aside these quiet moments of reflection, when the tables were turned and the delivery partners were asked what they would like to receive if someone surprised them instead, the answers varied. Gomathi, a delivery agent, said that even if her husband had gotten her a plate of barotta, she would have been “happier than all the people who received gifts that day.” Pawn Kumar, another agent, said, “10 rupees chocolate is enough.” For Shivani, it wasn’t anything materialistic. “Maybe quality time with him,” she said, smiling shyly. Shakthi said he would have been perfectly content with a simple public gesture from his wife in the form of a WhatsApp status. “That alone would give me the boost I needed,” he said.
After delivering so many carefully chosen tokens of love, what they all seemed to long for the most was the feeling of being thought of in return.