Acting The Saheb

“Twenty five buckets of water! You will bring twenty five buckets of water and clean it!” my father screeched.

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Sunday afternoons are always lazy and uneventful. If I’m not out and by myself, I’ll spend it in my room.

We have a small flat, on the ground floor. It’s in a relatively well-off neighbourhood. The bed in my room is horizontally placed against the wall containing the only window in the room. Right outside the window is a large bush, which is trimmed so that it fits the exact length of my window and ends just where the window begins.

I was in my room one Sunday afternoon, sitting on my bed. It’s my most favourite place to be, on days like this one. I heard an odd hissing sound, so I looked out and saw a strange man urinating in the bush outside. It seemed like he had purposely placed his three-wheeler goods vehicle close to the bush, because he stood wedged between the bush and the vehicle, doing his job in his make-shift toilet.

He didn’t know I could see him, from behind my Netlon.

I called my father, to come and see what was going on.

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My father, is not a hot tempered man. He can be so calm about things, that he can make you angry for it. He is always controlled. In many ways, he is even timid.

But that Sunday, something went off in him, and he began to shout like a mad man from inside my room. The trespasser was shocked and looked around alarmed, trying to find where this strange voice was addressing him from. He hurriedly pulled his zip and pants up, and hopped back into his vehicle, trying to appear innocent. I was watching all this, from inside my room. My father then stormed outside, and began to shout at this man again.

Apparently, the president of the apartment’s owner’s association had hired this vehicle, to pick up some furniture from her house.

The president of the owner’s association is a rich woman. She owns six dogs and three flats in our complex. She’s quite the bully and a force to be reckoned with.

By this time, a small group of maid servants, sweepers, security guards and drivers had gathered. I could see how hard they were trying to straighten their faces. Some turned away, and I knew they were laughing.

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The trespasser began to plead with his hands folded “Maaf kijye sir, maaf kijiye. Main patient hoon.” He then began to cough violently, his chest heaving in and out from the strain, hand placed over his heart. It didn’t appear to be a very real bout. He was obviously afraid of what the repercussions of his action may be. “Would they fine me?” Whether he was a heart patient or not, I will never know. However, he seemed to suffer from the illness of Elephantiasis, because even though he was a large man, one could see an abnormally large lower body, from his waist down.

That was when my father spotted a boy, of no more than twelve years in age, peeping out at the tamasha, from behind the vehicle. He was the helper, to the trespasser of the goods vehicle.

“Twenty five buckets of water! You will bring twenty five buckets of water and clean it!” my father screeched.

He did this first at the trespasser and then when he realized that the man didn’t look like he was going to oblige and his coughing increased dramatically, my father pointed at the boy, and screeched the same.

Acting the Saheb.

The boy reluctantly came out from his hiding place. One of the sweeper women shoved a bucket into his hands, stifling giggles all the while. Another woman helpfully pointed in the direction of a tap, that the gardener used to water plants. The boy began to walk in the direction of the tap. My father shouted again. “NOT THERE! That’s not for you to use. Go to the public toilet and fetch the water from there.”

Twenty five times the boy trudged up and down, from the toilet to the bush. By the time he got to the bush, there was hardly any water left in his bucket. It had left a trail all the way behind him, marking the path he took, for another man’s sin.

The offender sat in his vehicle all along. My dad stood outside with all the society-cleaners, supervising the young boy. The crowd began to dwindle. Only my father, the offender and the boy were left, my father still counting.

Spare Change

Originally written- 28th August 2008
Revised – 2nd October 2008

I have a very generous father. Not to me though. I’ve never been pampered. But we both share the same concern and interest in the welfare of the less fortunate, and he taught me to feel this way.

When we stop at traffic lights, scruffy looking little girls, and young but tired mothers, carrying babies with mucus all over their faces, often push their hands and sometimes their entire selves, through car windows, and auto rickshaws. While waiting for autos or to cross the road, the same faces of poverty, will crowd around you. They crowd around you, like the flies around them, penitently asking for us to spare them some mercy.

However, my father is often grudging with his alms when it comes to these unlucky souls. So I asked him about it. He justified, that this was all a big racket. Those girls who push themselves through tiny hoops, and mothers with bleating babies at their breasts, are all apparently pawns in a game. They all have to hand over their money to someone else, who’s getting rich off their sad faces.

Before you begin wondering about my father, let me tell you, that this is a thought process very common to us educated middle class folks. If you pay close attention, you’ll see that other people who do have a happy jingle in their pockets, refuse the sad empty begging bowls as well. These morally righteous souls are also afraid of supporting this black market, I suppose.

People feel that they are better off not displaying mercy. They fear that if they take out their wallets, it’ll probably be snatched and run off with. Weren’t they better off ignoring?

Returning to the idea of sparing your change and how it can save the world:

My dad and I discussed this, and this is what I had to say:

Give them the change. Maybe it is a racket. But if we don’t give them the money, they’ll have nothing to give to the racket –incharge at sun down, and finally, they won’t have anything for themselves either.

It’s a choice.

CHOICE 1-Would you want them to die of hunger, because you want to be a ‘responsible citizen’ and not allow the racket lord to get rich (because you believe in equal distribution of wealth, or some such other close to impossible ideology)? And remember, you don’t even know for sure if the particular beggar in question is involved in the scam.

CHOICE 2- Or would you just give them the few bloody coins so that they can put something into their stomachs?

So you say you want to be a responsible citizen?

Let me ask you then.

After a satisfying meal at a restaurant, don’t you leave more money on your dinner table as a tip than you give to unfortunate beggars in a whole week? But then, if you didn’t do that 10 percent, you wouldn’t come across as a nice person to the family on the neighbouring table, would you now. Please realize, that waiters and bearers are at least getting a steady and assured salary. I’m sure that they don’t earn much. That I will not dispute. But at least they know where their next meal is coming from. The beggar you just walked past, doesn’t know why he is living, if he is going to live tomorrow or if he should even hope that he lives tomorrow.

If you hire a taxi for a day of sightseeing, don’t you leave the cabbie with some money, so that he can get himself some lunch? You probably don’t have to do that. He probably brings his own ‘tiffin’ from home. But you want to be a nice person, so you give him the few notes.

At certain airports, passengers are informed not to tip the coolies. They are a free service provided by the airport. But most people always discreetly pass them some money.

Please don’t get me wrong. Tip all you want. Just don’t deny some mercy to that bedraggled face that just pushed itself through your window.

Or if you’ve got lots of money to spare, and want to be that nice person we all so earnestly strive to be, give money to everyone who needs it. Just don’t leave out the people that matter.