OF TEA AND GOLD FLAKE

  
 The Turmoil Within

 

          I saw her when I was coming out of my college gate; a frail woman in her late forties standing beside the road. A bag, as infirm as her, was sitting beside her feet. She was looking at the street. Both the ends of it till where the road turned into nothingness… what caught my eye was the look on her face… the look of helplessness… I recognized it because I have known the feeling of being helpless… and the agonizing pain that it comes with it. I, like most people would do, tried to sneak my way without attracting her attention… I

don’t know why but this behavior seems to have been engraved or etched in our minds. When you see someone helpless… whether a person lying on the road after an accident, a beggar asking for alms, or even a blind person crossing the street…. The first basic instinct that comes to our mind is to bolt… somebody else will obviously help….

        

           I was out to have my favorite cup of tea and a 69mm of delight, the Goldflake cigarette. It had become quite of a routine for me those days; to take a hike of 2kms on foot to go to my favorite tea stall and have a cup of tea and Goldflake( believe me, it’s the best in Bhubaneswar and worth the trouble). Before you say, yes I know it’s a bad habit…. but I had fallen into a routine.. so that day seemed to be just like any other day. It was 5 20pm and my blood was screaming for nicotine. So I set from my hostel with 10 rupees in my pocket on the way to Kalia Bhai Tea stall. It seemed like any other day till the moment she called me.

            

             Her face was a crisscross of wrinkles. She must have been around 40 years of age but long hours of working had taken a toll on her. She looked like someone their fifties. She was shorter than me. Her hands were a riddle of veins. She had a look of a defeated person. From what I could deduce from the tools she had with her was that she was a daily wage laborer. She had finished her days work and was on the brink of exhaustion. “Pua, town buss ketebele asiba?” (“Son, when will the town bus arrive?”) I turned back… I had already crossed her. I pretended not to listen. Then she asked again “Son, when will the town bus arrive?”. I finally could not ignore any more. I told her that it’s going to arrive any moment. Then she looked at the road with helplessness and said to me “Ghadiae hela thia helini, asini ta?”(“I have been standing for an hour”). Then I asked her where she had to go? She said she had to go to Khadagiri Square. It was around 3 kms from our college gate. “ Mo pila ekela achanti, rati helani.. mu kana karibi je”(My children are all alone in the home, what will I do now?”)… My instinct (and my blood, you remember the “screaming for nicotine” part) was telling me to walk away from this situation. You can’t help.. you have never helped any one in trouble. Let’s go and have that sip of finest dairy and puff of honey dew delight. But then again there was the look on her face… the look of pure helplessness and desperation that made me rooted to the spot. And that’s when I stopped paying heed to my instincts.

          

            “Why don’t you go by an auto Mausi?” I asked her… she said that her labor contractor had given her 5 rupees to catch the town bus to Khandagiri square… and she didn’t have money for the auto…. I thought to myself, “Should I offer her my 10 rupees?” but I didn’t have any more money. It was the last 10 rupees I had. “No” came the prompt answer from within me (I think it was the blood speaking within me). The bus will come. She will go and you will have your nice cup of tea and 69 mm of nicotine all to yourself… just wait it out…

   

    So I waited with the lady…

           

           At last the bus came… the lady was relieved, hell I was relieved.  The lady picked up her bag and thanked me for waiting with her. But when the bus arrived the conductor promptly denied her to get abode. When I asked he said that she only had 5 rupees with her and the fare was 7 rupees.. She was looking at me helplessly.. I tried to reason with the conductors but he didn’t agree… the bus left with him and grumbling about these bloody laborers and five rupees… Once again I was there; standing next to her... she looked defeated. There wasn’t another bus for the next 1 hour…She had become overwhelmed with emotion. Her eyes had become flimsy; but she didn’t cry… maybe she had faced such humiliations too many times… she looked at me.. I couldn’t look her I the eye.. there was way too much sadness in there for me to bear…” she seemed to be unaware of her surroundings..” mo pila mane kemiti akela thibe”(“How would my children be managing without me?” .. She was talking to herself. She wiped her eyes dry and again started looking at the road again. Maybe hoping to see another bus… a miracle? …. I couldn’t bear it any more..

        

          I did what I should have done way earlier… I scanned the road.. I spotted an autorikshaw.. I flagged it down… “ pua kana karucha.. mo pakhre paisa nahi…” I gave her a reassuring look and talked with the rikshaw wala. I gave the rikshaw wala my 10 rupees and asked him to drop her at Khandagiri Square. The lady seemed concerned..” mu kemiti tama paisa pharaebi je?”(“How will I return you your money?”). I assured her that there was no need for it. She was at first reluctant but finally climbed on to the auto.. I talked with the rikshawala and then said to her that I had given the money and he will drop her at Khandagiri square. She was overwhelmed.. she passed her hands over my head and blessed me.. “ Dhanyabad pua.. tumuku koti parmau milu… tame bada haeki khub paisa kamaaa u bhala manisha hua..”. I was embarrassed. Little did she know the turmoil that had been raging within me… the chaos of thoughts; the confrontation of tea, Goldflakes, morality, compassion and empathy inside of me, all within the 20 minutes I had stood with her? She thanked me again and again… the auto drove away….

          

       I know it wasn’t a great sacrifice… nor do I brag about it. It’s just that sometimes there occur small and possibly insignificant events in one’s life that makes them contemplate and evaluate themselves.. What have they have become? Who they are? And what do they want to become? I won’t say that this event has reformed me… or that I have become a different person… but yes, the 10 rupees that I had that day was well spent.. Yes.. Well spent indeed.

As I turn back to go to my hostel, Ritesh passes by me on the bike… he leave behind him a haze of smoke from the cigarette he was smoking…. The smoke seems to languidly hang about on the road, not dispersing, as if waiting for me … a smile crosses my face as I pass through the smoke… Yes it was Goldflake….