More than half way through my India trip I have realized that time flies faster than the speed of light. A vacation week passes much faster than a work week, vindicating "The Theory of Relativity". Explaining his famous theory Albert Einstein said "time flies slowly when you listen to a boring lecture, but it flies fast when you talk to a pretty girl". He stands vindicated.
In the initial days of the trip I didn't mind about spending money. Never bargained while buying from street vendors, gave them hefty tips to their ecstacy and in return got appreciations in form of bewildered looks to subtle chickles. But now I am starting to think - Am I spending more ? Do I pay more for the price of the commodity ? Can I get a cheaper bargain somewhere else ? May be from a visitor mindset I am slowly graduating to the mind of local resident.
During my school and college days I was a voracious reader of Odia and English books, varieties of newspapers and magazines. One of them was the SATHI (Friend) pocket series books - a series of Odia novels containing sagas of thrill and mystery, many of them detective stories. As the name indicated, the books were pocket friendly, thin and tiny enough to fit into one's pockets.
Remembered reading one such pocket series book - PATIA JANGALA RA SAAPA (The snake of the Patia forest). Patia on the outskirts of the capital city of Odisha was a rocky, red soil hamlet filled with rocks and ant hills notorious for harboring venomous snakes. Now the location has turned into a jungle of another kind - concrete jungle. The snakes living there now belong to a different species in form of real estate sharks of dubious characters. A friend just told me if you see a snake and a real estate guy in Patia, kill the real estate guy. Because the snake may leave you alone, but the real estate agent is guaranteed to ruin you. Anyway I hate concrete jungles and visit that part of the city only when it's absolutely needed.
Today I happened to be in Patia, located diametrically opposite to where I live. A long drive, not distance wise but due to the time taken to maneuver extremely unruly traffic. There is no traffic rule here in Bhubaneswar, every one from pedestrian to those driving vehicles, from bovine to stray dogs - each one makes his or her own rule. Yet every nook and corner you can see hoardings proudly proclaiming the state capital as a Smart city. Strings of multicolor underwears, Salwars (women's costume), Lungis (loincloth worn by many in India) adore the skylines of tall apartment buildings, fluttering in the wind as they dry out.
In the Webster's dictionary smart means "clever, witty, brainy" etc. But in local Bhubaneswar parlance a guy on a bike wearing shining shoes and chasing girls in the process of acquiring a girlfriend is considered a smart guy. The name "Smart city" tag given to Bhubaneswar speaks for itself.
Home sweet home - Our home is full of sweets, some bought by me and rest gifted by good samaritans, friends and relatives. My sweet blood attracts the Mosquitoes who apparently love sucking it using their straw like tentacles. Covid is not the only disease around here, as Dengue fever caused by mosquito bite is lurking in nook and corner of each home. These are highly resilient creatures. If they can survive Alaska and Minnesota, insecticides like DDT etc, they can survive anything.
I have been told to stay away from this murmuring species, but in spite of best efforts they still manage to feast on my blood sweetened by all these sugary stuff I am eating. No sooner a mosquito bites me than I get red boils and itching. Not that I hadn't been bitten by mosquitos before, but by staying away from them for quarter of a century I have lost my immunity from insect bite. By the time I start getting some immunity, my trip will be over. More later...
No comments:
Post a Comment