On New Year's Eve

I went to the racecourse and ran seven kilometers. I just felt the need to get it out of my system.

My cousin had decided to have a stall selling sandwiches, pop, dhoklas and kulfi. This was on Main Street. Not a bad idea considering that hundreds of people would saunter through – especially since the whole street would be a walking plaza. I thought it bit quixotic. I mean we didn’t need to sell foodstuff – not for the money anyway. But I guess it was a good idea since it kept my nieces and nephews occupied the whole day and gave them something to look forward to in the evening. It all turned out pretty well I think. We spent a lot of time watching the world go by without actually joining in the stream of mass humanity. What was the nice thing about the whole exercise though is that we didn’t end up selling too much. But my cousin’s altruistic intentions were pretty clear right from the start. My bhabhi and he went around distributing amongst all the young kids and sundry small-time sellers, which was a real nice gesture on their part. I think they made a lot of people happy, brought smiles to their faces and surely filled quite a number of stomachs.

I came home well before the midnight hour and passed our watchman listening to his radio. My mom fixed a small meal for us and after I brewed some fresh chai I invited our watchman to share a steaming cuppa.

I spent the rest of the evening writing and listening to music. I slept to Dire Straits.

A quite night at home.

I guess that the realization that the whole world was partying (music blared from neighboring apartment blocks) while we overlook so many people in our rush to enjoy ourselves cut me up a bit. We worry so much about our wardrobe, the “hip and happening” places we will go to for that “cool/hot” party and with whom we want to “hang out” with. In the mad rush we tend to forget the ‘invisibles’ of our society. The valet that parks my car, the bouncer that checks me in, the bartender that mixes my cocktail, the waiter that serves me, the cook sweating it over a cauldron. At least they are somewhere doing something and getting paid for it. And in that euphoria that happy occasions allow us we might even generously tip them. What about the guy on the corner of the street? The kids at the traffic light with their dusting cloth? The homeless? The poor?

I think Swami Vivekananda said ‘we need to reach out to the poorest of the poor’. A looking glass that alters one’s point of view is not a difficult thing to manage. Thing is that we need to stand at a completely new vantage point every now and then – to realize that there are so many things that we just do not see.

It is not bad to let my hair down… but perhaps if some time during the coming year I can spare a thought for them… and commit kind acts as often as I can… that ought to make it a happy year indeed.