Girl in The Bus

"Palakkadil ninu Bangloreleku pokuna super deluxe bus standite valathu bagathu nirthiyirikunu ticket book cheythavar dayavayi busil kayarendathanu” (The bus going from Palakkad to Bangalore is parked in the left side of the bus stand, those who have booked the tickets are requested to board the bus)

All started running towards the moving bus; these stimulus-response reactions will never change even though you have your seats reserved. The bus stand was crowded as usual; Sunday night all the inter-state travelers and students moving out kept a dull face - all hate Mondays. I was expecting some good looking girls in the bus. But KeralaSRTC buses are a dry place, I bet you it’s hard to find eye candy in this crap bus. Airavat and Kallada buses are really blessed in this respect.

As usual some gentlemen and women were late. I saw a somewhat ok girl coming near the bus; even cactus looks beautiful in a desert. She was accompanied by her dad and mom all speaking in a tamil-english-malayalam mixed accent. Her seat was just behind the driver’s seat and I was sitting behind her. He rapidly scanned the seats and the seat numbers, and then started shouting at the checker, (he saw some guy sitting next to her seat number)

Why don’t you have separate seats for ladies; seats should be reserved for ladies in online reservations, how I will send a girl alone in a bus with some guy sitting next to her. Its not safe and blah blah blah…………………….

I respect the care, social awareness, love, protective mentality of a dad. Seeing all of us molesters and the frequent usage of “I don’t mean you all” made all the passengers uneasy. Finally, another girl with a cute and innocent face stepped in. She was more than ok, a new oasis in the desert. The gentlemen sitting next to lady got up and gave the seat to the lady. WOW to the beautiful reflection in the glass opposite to me!!!!

The bus started moving and the girl’s dad and mom started following the bus till Chandranagar (I hope he stays there, thought I at the time), waving hands risking life and traffic rules. What a love, awesome ………. The moment the car moved to the pocket road the guy who was sitting in the seat next to cactus girl came with some other guy,

Mr: We both (cactus) booked the tickets together; can I take her to the last seat, this guy (pointing to the new gay) will sit next to you.

Oasis: hmm…….

New Guy: I am not imposing, it isn’t any of my business.

Cactus: (very humbly) Please………………

Every one's face “What the f**k” reaction. I was more than sad as I had only one reflection on the mirror.

The New Guy had a big bandage (seemed like some fracture case) on his hand, still the new girl was so scared to press the semi-sleeper button, and she stayed sitting upright all the way till Madiwala Ayyappa Temple. I was the lucky one: I had enough space to stretch out my legs as she didn’t pull back the seat.

If only the dad had seen all this...

Image Courtesy: © malvenko.net

Lali Rest In Peace

Girl With Two Faces: Nat Geo channel’s show about birth of a baby.

Camera starts: March 2008, birth of baby with rather unusual features which doctors named as craniofacial duplication, the baby was born with two faces, two pair of nose, two pair of eyes, two pair of lips and one pair of ears. The Nat Geo story was about how oddly birth and death are seen in a nation where majority of people’s lives in superstitions. The baby was born with good health in a “lower caste” (as termed by NGC) family, the mom and baby were healthy after birth, in-fact the baby weighed 4.5 Kg’s.

Near by villager’s starts flooding there to see the new infant, the baby was called as incarnation of Lakshmi and Ganesha. Peoples start offering fruits and flowers and money in front of the new born. The parents were even perplexed, they can’t even think of it’s a curse or a boon. They can’t decide on what next.

The camera rolls on; a doctor from Bangalore, Ashley Cruz comes in screen for studying the conditions of the baby. The doctor entreats for giving the child medical help. The health of the baby goes worse, the childish beauty starts fading, she losses weight and high dehydration losses the softness of baby, she turns like a weak skeleton. The show project inabilities of parents what to decide. They call village head and some elder men to decide on whether to give medial aid; all stuck up with the traditional ways of solving issues. Dr Cruz had doubts about anatomy of the child; he fears that the one of the mouth is leading to stomach and other leads to lungs. Flow of solid or liquid food may result in serious lung infections; his arguments don’t make any impact on parents. Even though scared about Lali’s health they can’t decided on things fearing the anarchies of family and community.

Finally, after declining all medical aid at the need time the baby gets admitted. It was too late to help the baby; the baby dies of pneumonia and blood poisoning. Lali turned out to be a victim of poverty, caste separation, anarchy, superstitions and inabilities of a community to put faith in science. The show ends with a comment from Dr. Cruz “it’s a precious life lost.”

The baby was given a eventful burial, the most eventful ceremony the villagers ever saw. After six months they build a temple for Lali, peoples are worshiping poverty, apathies, ignorance, anarchies and inabilities.

The biggest irony is that after a week, I read from Obama full text speech

“Washington has been telling us to wait for decades, even as the problems have grown worse. Meanwhile, China’s not waiting to revamp its economy. Germany’s not waiting. India’s not waiting, These nations aren’t standing still. These nations aren’t playing for second place. They’re putting more emphasis on maths and science. They’re rebuilding their infrastructure.”

Is India putting more “emphasis on maths and science” ?