FANCY PANTS!
Yea, I think I've heard this phrase for the first time in 10 years yesterday.
It feels great to run up to the roof and just yell out to the world.
To have the world know that you don't give a CRAP about what they have to say.
To just shout out "FANCY PANTS"
Its exhilarating.
Ahh! Exhilarating. Another exhilarating word. :)
Tuesday 28 August 2007
Haunted and Trivial
Their eyes, they still haunt me! Its been 2 weeks and I can't get that image out of my head. The image of addiction, poverty and a shattered dream.
Our school decided to take us on a 'night out.' On this 'night out' we were taken to chandini chawk in Delhi. Its where most homeless people live. This entire program is part of a BTG(Bridge The Gap) class. It focuses on showing us privileged children what the world is actually like, what India is actually like.
So it started in the evening, around 6 we left from school and reached chandini chawk around 9. We first walked across a bridge, where people rented mattresses for the night. I believe it was Rs.20/- a charpai, Rs.10/- a mattress and Rs.5/- extra for a blanket. it was estimated that about two hundred people sleep on that stretch of bridge which was approximately 300-400 meters long.
after that we walked the streets to a shelter. On the way we saw this girl, about 10 years old, lying on the side of the road. Her hair was matted and spread out around her head like a deathly hallow, her eyes were a milky blue staring into the depths of nothing, her mouth, slightly agape, displayed teeth that were yellow and rotted. her skin was a bit pastel-ish. She lay there, alone, I couldn't tell if she was alive. If she had died, nobody felt it was worth mentioning. people walked passed her with averted eyes and right into the neighboring McDonald's to grab a burger.
We soon reached the shelter where we were taken inside in groups of 20.
At the shelter, we learned of random police raids, of murders, of framing. The misery of the people was well summarized by a vocal local who had been staying at the shelter for over 5 years: "They don't know who committed whatever crime they maybe investigating so they automatically assume it's one of us. They believe as the homeless we shall resort to crime. What they don't understand is we make up to Rs 500/- and more in a day. we just don't have a house to come home to. That doesn't make us villains, criminals and murderers. We just want to live, to eat, to sleep, without suspicion. Peace"
"What can I do to help you ?"
"Nothing, you can do nothing except give us jobs."
How can we help these people, how are we supposed to help people who not only don't know who they are but also they don't even know what they are. Are we supposed to employ those thousands who already claim to earn 500 a day, are we to pay 15000 rupees to a person who doesn't know what his name is, who doesn't know what colour a tree is? What are we to do to help? How can we help? By the end of everything I feel the correct question would remain - Can anyone do anything to help?
We moved on.
We reached a garden. Children everywhere! Not one sober. Each in his own world, each in his own Nasha(high). We attempted to interact with the children. A seven year old boy answers my question on food, he says, "Didi, I don't care if I get my food or not. I need my Rs. 50/- worth of Nasha. Even if I can't collect the money, I borrow, I cheat, I steal, but I need my Nasha."
Children everywhere! Not one sober. We took a walk through the garden. I passed a man standing there with an aimless mission in his bulging yet vacant eyes which followed us along our path towards darkness and aimless lives. He was standing there. His mouth agape. Standing there, lurching. I still cant forget, I wont, I cant.
Children everywhere! Not one sober. A mother, holding a handkerchief soaked in drug to her infants nose. How can they escape the ghost, when the ghost they are brought up on becomes a part of them. How are they to escape something that without realisation has become something as precious to them as the blood running in their veins, the very blood adulterated by this ghost.
Children everywhere! not one sober. Their eyes, the vacancy, the lost dream, the hopelessness.
"Don't pity us. That's not what we want. Its our way of life. circumstances have made it such. Don't pity us. This is who we are"
I'm left standing. A clueless privileged child.
I'm left standing. Hollow and empty.
A few days ago, I was watching TV and there was this whole half hour report on this man that got beat up for committing a minor robbery. I could not help but think what if this man was just another one of the homeless believed to have resorted to crime, just "believed to have." He got beat up so bad that he almost died. He had stolen something insignificant so he could eat for that day. A police officer was responsible for his beating. He was attached to a motorcycle by his ankle and dragged along the road wearing only a dhoti. He was slapped and beaten and kicked until you could see he had turned blue even though his skin was a very dark colour. He was kicked in the face by 3 people who had shoes on. On lookers laughed and his mother was made to watch. She went mad with horror and she was slapped to bring her back to her senses. She too was tortured and told that the son she had didn't deserve to live, didn't deserve a fair trial, didn't deserve compassion. He took it all, what could he do? All for one meal. All this done on live TV.
Makes me feel like I have been living in Utopia compared to the Dystopia in which thousands such men are living. I was upset because my cell phone got confiscated. I thought the world was crashing down over me. The absurdity of it all! I've never hated myself more, never hated being privileged, never ever wanted to make such a difference as I do at this moment!
Yet as the day wears on I know, as sure as the sun will set and rise again, that my biggest problem tomorrow, will be that my mother wouldn't give my cell back, would tell me to study. What would I think then? Not of the scores of children who are working hard just to attend one day of school, just to make a semi decent life for themselves. No! I think and wonder about what I could possibly have done to deserve that sort of treatment from my mother.
So trivial.
So useless.
In the light of reality, ones life, seems like a trivial fantasy.
Our school decided to take us on a 'night out.' On this 'night out' we were taken to chandini chawk in Delhi. Its where most homeless people live. This entire program is part of a BTG(Bridge The Gap) class. It focuses on showing us privileged children what the world is actually like, what India is actually like.
So it started in the evening, around 6 we left from school and reached chandini chawk around 9. We first walked across a bridge, where people rented mattresses for the night. I believe it was Rs.20/- a charpai, Rs.10/- a mattress and Rs.5/- extra for a blanket. it was estimated that about two hundred people sleep on that stretch of bridge which was approximately 300-400 meters long.
after that we walked the streets to a shelter. On the way we saw this girl, about 10 years old, lying on the side of the road. Her hair was matted and spread out around her head like a deathly hallow, her eyes were a milky blue staring into the depths of nothing, her mouth, slightly agape, displayed teeth that were yellow and rotted. her skin was a bit pastel-ish. She lay there, alone, I couldn't tell if she was alive. If she had died, nobody felt it was worth mentioning. people walked passed her with averted eyes and right into the neighboring McDonald's to grab a burger.
We soon reached the shelter where we were taken inside in groups of 20.
At the shelter, we learned of random police raids, of murders, of framing. The misery of the people was well summarized by a vocal local who had been staying at the shelter for over 5 years: "They don't know who committed whatever crime they maybe investigating so they automatically assume it's one of us. They believe as the homeless we shall resort to crime. What they don't understand is we make up to Rs 500/- and more in a day. we just don't have a house to come home to. That doesn't make us villains, criminals and murderers. We just want to live, to eat, to sleep, without suspicion. Peace"
"What can I do to help you ?"
"Nothing, you can do nothing except give us jobs."
How can we help these people, how are we supposed to help people who not only don't know who they are but also they don't even know what they are. Are we supposed to employ those thousands who already claim to earn 500 a day, are we to pay 15000 rupees to a person who doesn't know what his name is, who doesn't know what colour a tree is? What are we to do to help? How can we help? By the end of everything I feel the correct question would remain - Can anyone do anything to help?
We moved on.
We reached a garden. Children everywhere! Not one sober. Each in his own world, each in his own Nasha(high). We attempted to interact with the children. A seven year old boy answers my question on food, he says, "Didi, I don't care if I get my food or not. I need my Rs. 50/- worth of Nasha. Even if I can't collect the money, I borrow, I cheat, I steal, but I need my Nasha."
Children everywhere! Not one sober. We took a walk through the garden. I passed a man standing there with an aimless mission in his bulging yet vacant eyes which followed us along our path towards darkness and aimless lives. He was standing there. His mouth agape. Standing there, lurching. I still cant forget, I wont, I cant.
Children everywhere! Not one sober. A mother, holding a handkerchief soaked in drug to her infants nose. How can they escape the ghost, when the ghost they are brought up on becomes a part of them. How are they to escape something that without realisation has become something as precious to them as the blood running in their veins, the very blood adulterated by this ghost.
Children everywhere! not one sober. Their eyes, the vacancy, the lost dream, the hopelessness.
"Don't pity us. That's not what we want. Its our way of life. circumstances have made it such. Don't pity us. This is who we are"
I'm left standing. A clueless privileged child.
I'm left standing. Hollow and empty.
A few days ago, I was watching TV and there was this whole half hour report on this man that got beat up for committing a minor robbery. I could not help but think what if this man was just another one of the homeless believed to have resorted to crime, just "believed to have." He got beat up so bad that he almost died. He had stolen something insignificant so he could eat for that day. A police officer was responsible for his beating. He was attached to a motorcycle by his ankle and dragged along the road wearing only a dhoti. He was slapped and beaten and kicked until you could see he had turned blue even though his skin was a very dark colour. He was kicked in the face by 3 people who had shoes on. On lookers laughed and his mother was made to watch. She went mad with horror and she was slapped to bring her back to her senses. She too was tortured and told that the son she had didn't deserve to live, didn't deserve a fair trial, didn't deserve compassion. He took it all, what could he do? All for one meal. All this done on live TV.
Makes me feel like I have been living in Utopia compared to the Dystopia in which thousands such men are living. I was upset because my cell phone got confiscated. I thought the world was crashing down over me. The absurdity of it all! I've never hated myself more, never hated being privileged, never ever wanted to make such a difference as I do at this moment!
Yet as the day wears on I know, as sure as the sun will set and rise again, that my biggest problem tomorrow, will be that my mother wouldn't give my cell back, would tell me to study. What would I think then? Not of the scores of children who are working hard just to attend one day of school, just to make a semi decent life for themselves. No! I think and wonder about what I could possibly have done to deserve that sort of treatment from my mother.
So trivial.
So useless.
In the light of reality, ones life, seems like a trivial fantasy.
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