Breaking point
Tragedy brings out the best in us. The nicest of words, deeds and thoughts follow a tragic event. The only downside with this arrangement is we can’t and don’t have a lot of tragedies. They are special occasions as their rarity accentuates the resulting effect on people. We can’t expect everybody to be compassionate to each other 365 days a year. That’d be an unreasonable demand.
Besides, we associate tragedy with what happens with others. In our individual space, we’re programmed to see things narrowly and avoid the T-word to describe what occurred. If we are alive enough to share the story, then it can’t be that bad, now, can it? At the most, we’d use the word ‘comedy’ to ascertain our misfortune. Nonetheless, we fail to see the humour when unwelcome happenstances are in vogue. Who’s going to laugh with a lump in their throat?
Well, two recent incidents might help us bring out the evocation required to fully grasp the aforestated difference.
Case 1: A friend of mine quit his job in favour of further studies and decided to visit the Purvanchal hills as a breaker. Being a trekkie, he wanted to trail around the zigzag-ish ranges. On foot, needless to add. To his bad luck, he lost the marks and started wandering in to thicks of forest. It was early afternoon when he realized he was lost. With a useless phone with zero network in tow, he kept walking having no idea where he was or where he was headed to. Having read somewhere long time ago that it’s best to seek stream on the hills if a person is lost, he sharpened his ears for the slightest of watery noise. No sound whatsoever. The only sound he heard belonged to distant birds. As the day dragged to its dusk, he could hear the annoying crickety symphony too. For over 4–5 hours, he was screaming his heart out so as to make somebody approach for help. Nobody responded except the birds and crickets. By 6pm, he had almost given up hope. The darkening of the sky painted a morose picture in his head. He stopped screaming too. And that’s when he spotted two bucolic men with wooden axes walking a few meters away. He was never happier to see someone; the irony being the strangers involved in this case. He ran, almost breaking down, barely able to say anything coherently and hugged them. They understood and showed him the way towards the camp.
Case 2: Two days ago, Mumbai received about 300 mm of rain within 24 hours. The city of 20+ millions — not counting the animals and birds we don’t give a damn about anyway — came to a screech. Not a standstill, mind you. People continued to move, not because they believe in the much-peddled Spirit of Mumbai but because they are no options left when the water breaches your knees and aims for your crotch. You’ve got to get home at least. My brother who is an assistant professor at a college in Churchgate left his office at 1. He reached our home in Sanpada 7 hours later. That’s a distance of about 31 km, which usually takes about a little more than an hour to transcend. He waited at the trainless station for a while before deciding to hit the road. He climbed on to a bus which got stranded at Dadar thanks to overwhelming water flow. His wasn’t a unique story for that day; there were thousands of similar experiences unfolding differently. And most of them thank their stars for being able to make it to their respective roofs. Many an unfortunate souls must have been sucked by those notorious man-holes — Mumbai’s chthonic setting — too. We’ll be reading about bloated bodies. However, as far as my brother was concerned, he realized for the first time in his life that you can’t really think straight when you’re completely wet and helpless. The coldness you feel then, not to underline the discomfort, reminds you of the otherwise stressful-yet-comfortable existence you lead. And that fucks with your head.
Tragic, no? Not really.
Comical, yes? Almost.
