Every other Saturday I eagerly look forward to reading the Indian Express' "Mumbai Newsline" section - waiting to read a column by Adi Pocha (Rebel Without a Clue). I enjoy my morning mug of SIFC (that's South Indian Filter Coffee, for the uninitiated) - LARGE, with a large dose of LIFE from Adi Pocha's column!! Kind of makes my day, you know...
Today's column was about the Bandra Worli Sea Link, and about "HOPE".... that set me thinking, reminding me of something that I've wanted to write for quite a while.... I came to Mumbai in 2003 and have been residing here ever since. Sometimes this city sets me wondering, teaching me lessons that I'd rather not have learnt. Some anecdotes, to illustrate..
I was new to Mumbai, February 2003. I'm driving back after meeting a prospect client at Thane, it is around 3 in the afternoon. Just near the check naka on the Eastern Express Highway I see a man pushing a car. Well dressed, around 30, a small child presumably his daughter in the passenger seat, he was very obviously struggling to push and steer the car safely. Other cars whizzed by, relentlessly in pursuit of deadlines. I passed him and saw a look of fear/anxiety on the girl's face. Pulling over to the side I got out and walked over to him and told him (can't help my gruff voice!) to sit inside the car while I pushed him. The look on his face was..... not relief but sheer terror! He seemed to say "WHY?". I gave him my most reassuring smile (I guess it worked, too!) and told him his daughter looked worried. A few metres away stood a cop watching indolently - peremptorily I called him over in my best "cop voice" and commandeered his assistance. Teaching the man to jump-start his car in second gear, watching him wave a thank you as he took off, the thought that lingered was NOT that no one else stopped.. what remained, till this day, is the look of fear on his face.
I see that look again and again when I stop to help - or try to help sometimes. No, I am NOT an angel (my colleagues, friends will vouch for that!) but just a human being who would love it if someone helps me if I'm in trouble.
A couple of elderly ladies, last year, stranded in heavy rains because the yellow-black ramshackle taxi just went dead near Ghatkopar. It was 7:45 at night, pouring rain, I asked my driver (yes, Mumbai has been financially kind to me) to stop by their side in the middle of the road. Terrified at first, slowly reassured, I dropped them off a couple of kilometres ahead at a rickshaw stand... Last month an elderly couple, the man a cripple using crutches struggling to walk toward a bus stop at Jogeswari. I offered a lift, telling them I was going to Powai and if they were traveling the same direction they could get in. Once more, that same look of fear, this time unswayed by my assurance they chose to go their own way...
Contrats this with life in smaller towns where the sheer absence of public transport perhaps makes people more willing/trusting... strangers who do not find it strange to hitch a ride.
Is this a city that has lost hope in the goodness of their fellow citizens? When I think of this and despair, I remember something that stands out as a beacon of hope..... 26th July 2005. Stuck on the bridge over Sion, traveling back from town, a thousand strangers would have had water and biscuits/farsan served by the families staying in the top floor of the two buildings adjacent to the fly-over. People are good, essentially, no. It's just that they're not used to kindness here in Mumbai all that often. Time nahin hain!!!
Sats
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