I believe the boundaries or margins define the structure, system and also provide dimensions. People living on the boundaries of our society are the pillars of the society. They define the nature of society and reflect our conduct, values very lucidly. These margins are the epitome of societal evolution. I think, I am cursed to have the eyes that identify these margins and attract vulnerability. Every time, I stumble upon them are during the most unexpected situations and my remaining faith in humanity and my capacity to change the status quo starts evaporating in an accelerated way.
I have stopped going to social functions, market, literally speaking everywhere. The path to office, the office and the surrounding of office are the existing realities of many intersectionality of margins. I am happy that, I work in such a condition, where my vulnerabilities are cherished and I got an opportunity to help in addressing issues of people living in the margin.
I am in my early thirties. After a lot of conflict with self decided to book the ticket to Puri for our first school reunion. I used to study well and kind of aloof and they always were in need of some notes or assignment, so this relation clicked. I was never very close to them but was also never very away from them, kind of indifferent to them. I got a group to be invisible and they got, what they needed to score well in exams. I am planning to be as normal as I can, not to look at the margins and to behave like the rest. The hotel, claimed to be at the sea side is actually half a kilometre away from sea. Do not know, if the sea has receded or the hotel is misleading us. The hotel walls have turned grey white from ivory white with the gossip of sea winds, the hotel though small but is clean. I saw 5 young lads, hardly in their late teens, dressed in their khaki uniform with red caps busy with the hotel affairs. It was late evening and the sun was at the margins. The horizon is crimson and occasional stars are littering the sky. I went to the dining space, which is booked for 10 of us for the get together.
The dining space was quite dark. The only lights were coming from the candles at the tables and the tilted yellow LED bulbs mounted on the four large paintings of Puri (one of the Puri temple, one of sea beach, One of patta Chitra and last one is of Konark Sun temple) with large, black, bold message of welcome to Puri. I saw the nine of them huddled around the centre table and all dressed in full shirts and pants. I was the only one in my jeans and t-shirt. My marginalisation started and I pushed the thought to some deep corner and started to mingle with others. As my eyes got accustomed to the darkness, i saw we are the only 10 in the room as guests and three waiters were standing in the corner to serve us. The three are from the lot I saw in the morning, still clad in their Khaki coats and red caps, in the unimaginable sultry climate of Puri.
One of my friend proposed to start our discussion with an ice breaker game. The game was quite simple, a spin the bottle game where at every time the bottle stops, one person, in particular the person facing the bottle will take a sip of vodka and share one memory of school days concerning all of us and then how the life has fared to him till now. I thought we are friends, human beings and can we not connect with each other on the planes of our love that we need icebreakers. But I decided to go with the flow. The bottle was brought out by one waiter with a face full of acne and with a coat marked with salts of his sweat. The other waiter with curly hairs came and laid the plates in front us. His uniform was torn at many places but are skilfully stitched again. The last one with a dimple came with a starter and served on the plate. He had a bandage on his right hand near the wrist, may be due to some accident. I imagined a street fight, where this cute fellow is fighting with a bunch of goons. The bandage was grim in colour and I could sense from the twitching of his hand that the wound is still fresh and he may be under pain.
I was the fifth one, whom he served. I, asked him, “ it still hurts ?” To my surprise, he said yes and others turned to me. There was an awkward pause in the reverie of banal discussions. Everyone started asking him many questions and he just smiled at them all and went to the corner. One of my friend said quite loudly not to spoil the mood of the group by raising such trivial issues. Another added that the injured one should not serve, not because of the pain he was having but because his bandage was dirty and who knows with what kind of wound he would infect us all. We all are working people and cannot afford to be ill. He did not come to serve again.
“Are these really my friends? What am I doing with these people? Most of the world is like this but what am I doing with them?” I could not push these thoughts any further and realised I need some time to breath and to be normal. I excused myself from the discussion and went outside. The three guys, the three waiters or three Musketeers were sitting on the balustrade. One of them came and told me not to share about the injury to the management otherwise they will sack him. I assured him we will not do anything like that quite pompously. But internally, i still do not know how the others would behave and can I ever pass the message to them?
The three are hesitant initially but they started to share their life, their aspirations and condition of work. One of my friend came and dragged me to my seat. There many of them started voicing, how I avoided them from school days, how proud I am, how I always remain in my cocoon and how I ruined their party by going to the poor waiters. One of them said that it was evident while planning that I would be a tough nut to be in the group. They wanted me to be with them, behave like them and to share about life and all as per plan. They wanted me to follow a schedule, a schedule to reconnect with people of importance in life.
But I was already pushed to the margin, where I was wondering “how could we divide people among rich and poor, why do we need such elaborate meetings to vent ourselves out, why can we not see pain of others, how come a game was supposed to make us more close, when we actually are pretending to each other in the name of name and fame, why all of a sudden this informal gathering became so formal that my genuine enquiry in to the life of others became indecent.” The only resistance I could show was by sitting there silently. I smiled at all of them and sat there for time immemorial. By the time, I reached my room, I was exhausted to breath in this phoney society and my friends( which I do not wish to call them, now onwards) were pissed at me for being a spoil sport.
Lying on the bed, I am weighing the two options, “there is a train in the early morning to go back to home and there is also another day’s reservation here to stay and speak my heart out to all of them.” May be, I too live in the margins of the society.
–END–
