My uncle who was in the army

Everybody calls him fauji (the soldier) in our family as he has served many years in the army and have fought two wars. Kids (once upon a time, a long time back, we were kids) call him fauji uncle. He’s the husband of one of the sisters of my father.

A few days ago I met him after many years. It was sad to see the fauji in him totally broken — body and spirit. In a fit of sentimentality when we were sharing a peg of Chivas Regal, he said, “My whole life has been a waste…I have worked so hard all my life and yet, I have nothing left with me.”

A few days ago I had written somewhat similar thoughts of my guruji’s. My guruji too, feels that he has done nothing in his life.

In the early seventies when my father left his railways job and started searching jobs abroad, fauji uncle left the army and joined him. Ever since then, both have been toiling on various foreign lands: from Libya to Baghdad to Abu Dhabi. It hasn’t been that tough for my father because my father mostly did mental work and a group of engineers worked under him. Fauji uncle on the other hand did physical jobs and the last ten years of his working life he spent operating a heavy-duty crane in the burning deserts of the UAE. He kept sending money to his family: a wife and three sons. He has a big house in Ambala. Ambala is a large town in Haryana…my paternal grandparents lived there and I too spent some early years there with them…I have often written about it. Whenever fauji uncle visited India he built one or the other portion of the house.

Whenever he got a son married, he gave a big portion of the house to that son. He has spent all his money on the house and the sons. His sons have been a big disaster. The eldest takes drugs and drinks a lot. He hardly earns any money to sustain his family of perhaps one wife and three kids. He earns about Rs. 3,500 (approx. $82) per month. The middle one is a bit Ok; he works in Abu Dhabi as an electrician. The youngest has been the biggest trouble for the family. He not only takes drugs and heavily smokes tobacco; he lost so much money in gambling that the goons wanted to kill him. Fauji uncle had to pay more than three hundred thousand rupees (approx. $7000) to get the goons off his son’s back. Now after retiring from the hard work he has opened a small electricals repair shop for his youngest son, but most of the time, he is the one managing the shop.

What a fellow he was and how he has turned out to be. I remember once he told me there was so much heat in his body that when he was posted in Laddakh, he used to bathe in a semi-frozen stream. This winter it was difficult for him to tolerate 8 degrees Celsius. Twice in one month he obtained injuries after retiring. First his two-wheeler scooter was hit by a motorbike. His shoulder broke and the keys in his back pocket dug into his lower back and cost permanent nerve damage. Then he fell into a hole on the road, almost bleeding to death through a big gash in his chin. Now he cannot move his right arm without the help of his left hand. His feet are so swollen that he cannot wear normal-sized slippers. He walks very slowly, stooping, with a limp sometimes.

I think of him and wonder, what has brought him to this sorry state? He sons? His wife (who could neither bring up the sons properly in his absence nor give him the kind of love he should have gotten)? His own way of planning his life? Or his fate?

I don’t believe in fate as such. Circumstances, yes. How would have I turned up had I lived in a small town like Ambala all my life without my father, with a mother who didn’t exactly know how to inculcate good values in me, and among peers who gave two hoots about studies and a proper career? Wouldn’t have I become like one of his sons? Even his wife, my aunt, was brought up in the same locality, amidst the same kind of atmosphere. She wanted her sons to do well in studies but implemented draconian methods while teaching them at home. Studies for her children meant, lots of beatings, abuses and other sundry punishments. After a while, perhaps, after totally fudging the concept of studies for her children, she gave up, and her children, having grown up, stopped listening to her. They had a lavish house, they had a father who kept sending sufficient money from abroad — there was no need for them to worry. In their own little, convoluted world, they couldn’t see very far into the future.

The biggest blame lies on my uncle according to me. He always provided for his family no matter how miserable he felt, and this tragic trend I have often observed amongst many parents in India. They become martyrs at the cost of their children and themselves. They have this idea that no matter how dud their children are, they have to look after them. I think the most important priority of parents should be to give a good upbringing to their children, and give the required support if it helps them further their goals. If the children don’t take initiative, try to steer them towards the right path, and if still they don’t heed, leave them to their means and take care of your future.

Inaccessible hospital

My father had a bypass surgery this 23rd March so Alka, my younger sister Dolly and I had to spend the night in the hospital’s (Escorts Heart Research Institute, New Delhi) lobby. Initially we had planned to go to the cafeteria and spend the night in the adjacent lounge, but there was no elevator. I tried to climb the stairs but there was severe pain in my knee-cap (I’ve been gaining weight!) and the effort required to climb even a single step was beyond my belief.

It is disturbing to note that such an internationally renowned hospital thinks that a physically challenged person shouldn’t be visiting the hospital as some other patient’s relative and hence, there should be no need to make the cafeteria accessible. We had to spend the night in the lobby. There were many other visitors there and we all slept on the sofas.

Then in the morning the hospital staff was taken aback when they discovered (I being on the wheelchair) that I was not the patient but a relative who wanted to attend the post-operation session conducted by a social worker where they tell what all precautions should be taken while taking care of the patient. They didn’t have ample space for a wheelchair and a doctor suggested we should be the last to go inside. Alka was furious but didn’t say anything, not sure what would be mine and my mother’s reaction. I’m used to such reactions and I think people mostly behave strange because they are not prepared to see a wheelchair-bound person as other than a patient.

But I think all the sections of the hospital should be accessible. Why assume that certain sections will never be visited by certain people?

Drilling in Alaska

Greed has no limits. The American senate recently Ok’d a bill to begin oil drilling. Sadly, it is the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The Arctic region is a fragile eco-system and tiny disturbance can wreck havoc with the overall environment of the world. It’s a shame.

Visa for Modi

Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat has been denied visa to enter the US. I think he should be denied visa to enter even India. He should be sent to Iraq in fact.

Update

No, I have not retreated back into the cave. In fact I’ve been out hunting…I’m hungry for work and I’ve been getting it. Previously I used to post a lot especially when I had lots of work, but that was programming. Now I mostly do writing — web content writing — and it’s been a hell of an experience. Writing doesn’t tire me…the constant communication with clients does. Unlike programming, content writing projects are very small and they don’t last for more than a few hours. This means I have to get lots of clients, and keep getting them until I’m so known that one project fetches me thousands of dollars :-). Although I get many queries every week, only a few turn out to be paying clients. Still, it is much, much, much better than doing something else. And earning hasn’t been bad too.

I woke up a bit sad in the morning…one of those phases when you feel doleful without any particular reason. Alka told me to put on some songs and sit outside for a while. I listened to the songs and felt gloomier. I haven’t been happy with my singing. In fact I didn’t wake up sad. I became sad when I practiced. I realized I couldn’t sing the notes properly. I blamed myself for not practicing enough, felt discouraged, and wrapped up the one-hour practice in fifteen minutes. Talk about not being able to sing well! I give up too easily and sometimes I can’t help it. On the other hand I’m known as a person who doesn’t give up easily. This is a strange contradiction.

While outside I saw a bee writhing in the mud. She was dying. Again and again her wings buzzed as she tried to fly but instead she got feebler and feebler. There it was — death happening in front of my eyes. A whole world dies when a living being dies. A whole world was dying while I was feeling wretched about not being able to sing well. I couldn’t relate to the bee because its agony was much greater, but she seemed to be, sort of accusing me. “Look here,” she seemed to be saying. “I’m dying. The days I’ve lived are over. The days I used to buzz around flowers collecting nectar are over. My story is finished; my existence is on the verge of vanishing. I’m alone here, wrapped in the mud, broken here and there, trying to take off in vain, missing my friends who are still busy up there doing all sorts of things and feeling totally happy. Gathering honey in the hive. Oh! Can you imagine how I feel when I see my hive, my home from this distance and realize I’m never going to fly back to it? You, on the other hand, have all the things you need. You have around you someone who cares for you and is always going to be beside you. You have all the time in the world to achieve what you want to achieve. Feel sad when you die like me…alone, in the mud.”