Eastern Promises
Promises. Making them - quite easy, but when they come back
to haunt you for action, you curse yourself why didn’t you listen carefully
before agreeing.
I had been dropping people to the railway station regularly,
the beautiful road, the villages and the chance to ride the bike were stimulant
enough and compelled me to do it time and again, people thought it was my
generosity. People can be so naïve.
On one such occasion while I was busy boasting about some of
my riding achievements to a small crowd of ill-informed overworked colleagues,
one future Harvard alumni came and
struck a deal with me which required me dropping him to the railway station at
5 AM in the morning. In that charged up moment when I was in full swing shaping
the minds of people, I agreed to the deal without much thought.
5 AM - A call
arrived, a deep baritone voice, quite concerned, was enquiring; would we be
able to leave within the next 10 minutes.
Leave!! Where to? What for? It 5 AM in the morning bro, let
me sleep that’s the best part of the day, don’t ruin it, meri Shahi neend me
khalal mat daalo.
“But you had promised! How shall I catch the train then, I
have no options left.” Says the voice on the other end of the phone. He did
have the qualities to be a business graduate.
Promises. Making them – quite easy ………. *the lines started
repeating in my mind in “main samay hu” voice*
A quick glance at the bike, and the faint recollection of a
youtube video where the rider reached 170 kmph on the same bike gave me
strength to proceed with the endeavor.
Getting ready was easy, 3 minutes flat I gave a call back,
the Harvard prospect’s voice sounded wet, marred with an occasional thunderclap.
The Monsoon had decided it was time to go ahead with the scheduled rainfall.
The monsoon still decided for the people of India.
The bike just went out of the picture, my dreams of setting
the land speed records where shattered. So took the Sedan killer to fulfill the
promises. They were ready to hop in; a certain geeky guy who was constantly
amused by the things around him too joined us. The company was good, the
weather electrifying and the journey looked promising. The desert state got
converted into a hill station during the rains the arid vindhyas took green
cover at the hint of rains and all kinds of flora and fauna sprouted from
nowhere to make the atmosphere magical if not romantic.
We had a timeline to reach the destination; the accelerator pedal
was being used to its limits I felt like the rally car drivers; negotiating the
village roads with harmonic precision and blinding speeds.
Whenever we crossed a village all we could see where
children in school uniform, blue upon whites waiting in the heavy rainfall for
some kind of conveyance which could take them to their school. At our age rainy
day called for skipping school altogether, but skipping school was not an
option here. People back at home must have left for work, and the only hope of
having lunch for them was if they could reach school on time. Boys were not to
be seen .
Girls. Clutching the bunch of books against their chest, their
main concern was how to reach the school, they were on tractors tailors, mini
pickups, trucks, and they were everywhere. As if they had enrolled in some leadership
program and their first assignment was to reach the school; come what may. And boy where they not succeeding.
The ad campaign for nike “Bleed Blue” had found an entirely
new definition, the atmosphere had turned blue.
In the morning when you see the streets lined with kids
donning their uniforms ready to leave for school you hope that the nation is on
the right path. You hope that the
promises you made to the future generation are respected.
Suddenly the rains stopped for a few moments and you could
see kids criss crossing the length and breadth of the entire highway hurrying
to reach their destination.
We stopped the rally car, the sedan killer for a few minutes
and got down to let them pass by and enjoy the fresh morning air.
Their certainly was an east wind coming.
What it had in store was beyond our grasp , but the train
was to be caught the schedules to be met , time was a scarcity, we were from a
different world so we continued ahead at breathtaking speeds but were we moving
‘ahead’ was the question.
