Journeys towards civilizing

From a Monkey to Slaves to Subjects to People, thou someone tell Bend who is the best talker and argumentative of thine all?

Phone not lost

Oh! where is it gone? It was just about here? I scratch my crotch; not because of the muggy weather sustaining outside but, for I am in the driving seat of car, have shut the engine down, and I am searching for my phone about everywhere inside. No trace of it. “Damn’t it was here just a few moments back!”

Drive a little up ahead. An auntie is busy with setting up and preparing at the evening enterprise stall next to the Sarabhai centre on the University Road. There are a few other larries opening too. On the backdrop is rare blue monsoon sky, evening sun trying hard. “Hi auntie, can I use your phone? Mine seems to be lost.”

“Oh what happened Beta?”

”Ok, I will be there in five minutes”

”Losing handset is okay, but main is that you lose contacts beta. Now beta, you must hurry up”

”Oh yes…”

Unsaid thanks and grateful I step up the gas.

Traffic isn’t supportive at all in the char rasta close to the Xaviers college. The jam didn’t last for longer but the mobilists and motorists had made a big scene out of it. Apart from honking and contributing seen and unseen dhuan, all Foren Audit standards will probably ask for is a few three four lanes on this road. Two AMTS buses, many cars, many more two-wheelers, cyclists, pedestrians, and so-and-so were all interlocked. Only the braver or mightier would get out faster.

“Suno, did you see anyone walking with a lost phone?”

“No why? Hey, aren’t you the same Sahib? Heh heh.”

An hour back I had robbed him of his illegal demand for Five Rupees for car parking charges. On the CG Road the stipulated and common charges is Rupees Two. The phone was probably lost here and this is where the person who picked my phone said we shall meet.

“Ok Gimme your phone”, a Chinese handset which looks scratchy and different. I take his help to turn knob and dial. The phone looks more hep than the branded ones I see around in branded shops.

“Hey you got enough balance?”

Nods with his eyes - “Yes, don’t worry”.

“I have to rush to Law Garden. Here, keep this Tenner. Enjoy.”

Next to Swati restaurant I speak to Swati restaurant ka Chowkidar, “Where is this Raj Kamal Apartment?”

“mmm?”

“next to Swati I am told.”

“No, it must be Neel Kamal. See the gate going inside? ...First one”

Inside the gate, no one is around, so I climb up to the first floor.

It is a tour and travels office. Two men in dirty sky blue shirts and black trousers are sitting easy and stretched using four to five wheely office chairs they have in vicinity. The office is well lit with surplus tube lights.

“You have my phone?”

“Which phone?”

“Can I make a call from your landline phone?”

“Sure Saab”

I fiddle and scratch the phone

“Dial zero sir”

“Oh ok…where do you say I come?”

I hand over the phone to one office guy.

“He says he is downstairs in his car. Do you need me?”

“No”

“Let me know if you need me.”

“No one was around. It took 10 minutes.”

“Can I use your phone?”

“Hey hun, I will be late, I am searching for my phone”

“Oh is it? The person is saying he is next to chai-ki-kitli.”

“is it so Saab? I will come along.”

At the Kitli, “Saab let me dial your number”... “He says he is at the apartment block nearby.

The scene afterwards can be painted with words. Me and the tour guy talk a momentary desolate walk to a block of high rise apartments. Six seven of the apartment blocks look dominating when evening dusk mixes with the night. In the entrance is the gate keeper’s cabin. Next to the cabin a well dressed middle aged man is sitting on a typical scratched broken plastic chair with complete authority.

“Prove it, it is your phone.”

“Yes, Many thanks”

And suddenly from nowhere appear, I can count, around ten fifteen people, to participate in the scene.

“Prove it, it is your phone.”

Same regular human talk followed and I did eventually got my phone back. “Okay he is a helper, pay him something you feel like. Honesty is tough to find these days.”

“Okay, I fill find some change.”

I find change at the chai–ki-kitli, and so, chai too. A man selling agarbatti who himself manufactures also sold me his sample for MRP 15/-, no address or contact on it. Says, chai-ki-kitli I smy contact. The helper guy, the guy who had actually found my phone is poor monetarily. He got half of tip he probably expected- MRP 51/-. I was told later I should have given at least 100/- - honesty is tough to find these days. I gave him lift to Paldi. Paldi is south of the city while I had to rush home north. He wasn’t insistent about the lift part but I had to drop him some decent place nearby where he gets some decent access.

Agarbatti: Incense sticks

Beta: Son, Child

Chai-ki-kitli: Tea Stall

Char-rasta: Cross roads

Chowkidar: Watchman

Dhuan: Smog

Larries: Hand Carts

MRP: Maximum Retail Price

Suno: Listen

What becomes of us is what we want to be

This world, the funny world,
I become a doctor so I see I can heal bodies in pain,
I become a lawyer so I know every man is the same,
I become a writer so I see all equal plain,
I become an artist so I can see logic even in vain,
I become a judge so I can see justice as an aim,
I become nothing so I see funny world.

Banjo and his parental Bend

A realization came in to Bend when he was washing his dog Banjo after his usual morning walk that lasted slightly about more than an hour.

Monsoons in Ahmedabad have stayed for long, like they do once every three or four years. This creates rain puddles and Banjo loves to jump on them. This makes him dirty and he needs cleaning before he enters the house. Fourteen months old, the Labrador is full of energy and has become swift and grand – and has agility which not many in the pados* can match. The street mongrels, the faltu* dogs, now get scared of Banjo from the stride itself which he develops before he says he will pounce on them. Not all of them are scared of Banjo, for he is nice to ones who are nice to him.

Banjo hates this forced cleaning but he doesn’t have an option. He can use his swiftness and grand strength to run away but chooses not to. He doesn’t wants to trouble Bend beyond a point. He knows he has nowhere to go.

Probably, similar references can be drawn for kids who grow up in a cozy well loved parental or family environment; and after they have grown up a certain age, in other words when they become adults, are left to their own devices and the future. There are no chains to tie them to a pole.

*
faltu: extra not needed
pados: neighborhood

Write Quickly

I wanted to write a blog but I cannot. We need to think as we type, and it seems ants have found a temporary colony in my laptop's keypad.