I’m writing this after just hearing a huge as chili bomb go off on someone’s stairwell, opposite our ground floor home. The house shook, I could feel the sound waves of the blast reverberating inside my chest. Just an hour or so back, my flatmate and I went out and asked the ‘kids’ in the neighbourhood to stop lighting all their chili bombs, 100 meter crackers etc etc right outside this lane where all the ground floor home owners have had clocks falling off walls, window panes shaking and more chest-cavity shaking than they’d care to have this Diwali.
Now for some clarifications, the ‘kids’ in question are not juveniles like I expected but young men, some older than ‘young’, dressed in nice formal collared shirts, trousers and shiny shoes. Despite telling them, they’ve coolly ignored all requests, from everyone to shift their fun to the TWO parks available at either end of this lane of houses. They’re lighting their crackers right next to people’s parked bikes a little oblivious to the possible dangers of exploding fuel tanks and when told so their only response is ‘it won’t do that and if it does, it does’. Ahem, are you telling me you’ll foot the bill for a charred bike? Or a few charred homes? Ahem, I doubt that. More shocking is the fact that these very same bunch of boys let a small kid, must be around 5 to 6, hold a lit fuse for a cracker in HIS hands and no one perhaps thought, ‘Gee, this might be unsafe for a kid to do’.
As my flatmate and I sat down inside her room, bass-blaring music going on in the background in an effort to drown out all the explosions, she said something about Indian festivals which I just feel has sadly gotten truer with every passing year – that Indian festivals these days have become more sadistic. I thought for a second and yah, it’s true. I mean, Holi is also a day where people have free license to touch you and smear you with colours. When done amongst friends and people you trust, there’s nothing harmful about it but sometimes, I’ve heard from others too how it’s a little disconcerting to see the glint in people’s eyes when they’re about to ‘touch’ you. Or throw water balloons at you. Or throw buckets of water at you from higher floors up. I think more than anything, I just don’t like that glint in the eyes.
After taking the dogs out for a walk…
We’ve been patiently waiting for the cracker bursters to disperse so we can take our two dogs for their night walk. Just when exiting our place, one kid lit a cherry bomb because they saw us taking the dogs out. It gives him and the others some weird sadistic joy and satisfaction. Fine. Coming back, the same pudgy kid, who thinks a little highly of himself, decides to pick a argument with my friend saying ‘You must be happy we’re going’ and she said, ‘Of course, it’s past midnight’ and etc etc. Threats were issued with my friend saying the cops can be called and the kid replying, call them, your house will be the first house I’ll burst my crackers in. Ahem. Like I said, may the shock waves from the crackers render him impotent. Amen.
I noticed a few things about the Indian mentality that just makes me wonder if we’ll ever really be able to call ourselves a ‘developed’ nation in the sense of how we treat each other. The kid in question didn’t even take my friends proverbial insult of ‘saale’ to heart because it came out of the mouth of a ‘girl’. Worse for us still, it came out of a ‘North East girls’ mouth. Am not saying North East people aren’t biased or prejudiced, they definitely are. Ever heard of tribalism? There you go. But let’s put things into perspective before you decide to bring moral behaviour based on ethnicity into the picture. Sure, North East people party, drink, live-in, play music, possibly get into fights but I’ve seen Punjabi’s and Jats do the same. So how is it we become lesser than human beings for doing the exact same things that so-called ‘Indian’ people are doing? Plus, we come to these cities, pay atrocious amounts of rent, get constantly picked on for the way we behave, eat, dress etc, so if we turn into mini-alcoholics and have friends over to chill, I think it would have to be the public’s fault for putting us under so much stress due to constant over-monitoring. I am by no means a victim. Hell no, I love being in Delhi, it’s almost like a second home. But there’s no denying that there’s some form of discrimination if someone who doesn’t feel like a victim observes certain things too.
So back to Diwali: when my friend complained, some old lady was hurling insults saying if we want to burst, we’ll burst crackers as much as we want, the whole year round they play loud music and party and suddenly we can’t burst crackers. Ahem. First point – burst as many crackers as you want, just don’t do it right in front of people’s homes that their wall clocks fall off and window panes shake and as for partying the whole year round, I think it can be scientifically established that that’s humanly impossible. Then the lady went on saying the whole world is celebrating today, you can’t stop people bursting crackers. Ahem. Point two – I didn’t’ know the whole world suddenly became Hindu, so might have been fair to say people in Delhi are celebrating. Sidenote: Others are bursting their crackers in the park.
There’s is a wonderful absence of ‘feeling for the other’ or empathy in the general public. There is more an ‘every man for himself’ attitude here which translates to, ‘If I want to to do it, then I’ll do what I want’. The streets are a mess, I don’t even want to think about how many more maimed dogs there will be tomorrow (they like to tie crackers to their tails). Seems there’s actually a law that bans the bursting of crackers and no noise after 12 am…it’s 1:09 am and crackers still going strong and noise level pretty much up there too. Am sure that same pudgy, now impotent, kid came to plant one cracker close to our place because there was a loud bang not too long back. Also I’ve noticed, people really have a problem when you’re kind to animals. When you’re not there, they chase them away and I don’t get it. If the animal is not bothering you and you’re not feeding it out of your own pocket, then why do you even care if it sits there in some dark gulley?
I do not want to live anywhere else, the cost of living here is still dirt cheap compared to outside. Plus, I find India far more interesting and confusing. But this country makes me worry so much. It’s so insulated and culturally communal (after 60 plus years of independence I still hardly see mainland people eating some good ol’ North East food, just like I don’t see North East people willing to eat roti, try paneer or stop fainting if there’s no meat in their daily consumption). I know all this is coming out from annoyance and anger over what a stupid now ‘impotent’ kid said but it’s really alarming when you see such things happen – are sons so above reproach that they can do anything they want and even elderly ‘aunties’ are powerless to scold them? If you’re more concerned about the great anti-corruption wave and rapidly developing the economy than the ‘phenomenon’ stated previously, then I truly worry for us all. The cities and the posher colonies in South Delhi or in Mumbai etc are really the worst indicators to go by as to how we’re developing as a society. And right now, I’m just worried, worried, worried because there, there’s discrimination of a whole new kind – discrimination based on status. Brhhhh, that worries me too. All this plus, when such acts are accompanied by the loud shouting of ‘Happy Diwali’…anyone else worried?
mymusingsaday 