The voice of the unpopular has many stories to narrate. But all I heard in the silent screams was complaints. I heard them but never stopped by to listen. The same complaints they would be, I had always thought until the pandemic hit and turned things upside down.
I was getting cosy and comfortable with press conferences, high-profile seminars and conferences and meeting ordinary people who were credited with extraordinary works. Agitations and roaring sloganeering had numbed my ears and the voice of the unpopular was fading in discord. Nothing provoked me to hunt for the stories the homeless and the destitute had in store, discarding them as ‘pocketful of mumbles’. The virus changed my course of thoughts and put me face to face with reality that never looked so real.
“We did not get food”, “We need medicines”, “We are not getting ration, we do not have ration cards”, — were the ‘complaints’ spewed by hungry mouths.
They care less about hand hygiene or masks. All they want is a proper meal a day. The gluttonous society had gobbled up their words rendering them voiceless and I never realised it.
Born and brought up in a city, I also did not realise that humanity has not completely perished and hope is not mere charred remains of unfulfilled dreams.
So here I am slowly becoming a part of their stories, my words commingling with theirs, my dreams reducing to nothingness and my vision lost in an impenetrable darkness. Yes, the lockdown gave me the opportunity to explore the other side. It gave me a chance to interact with the children of a lesser god. They have nowhere to go and there is no one to listen to their plight. They are surviving all by themselves. Childhood is long lost. However, I cannot dismiss the works of the quiet messiahs who are trying to save them from the squalor.
This write-up is a piece of my observations and some broken thoughts having visited the COVID-19 relief camps and shelter homes and interacted with people there.
Pangs of separation
At the relief camp, the men and women narrated their agony on being far away from their loved ones. Physical distancing proved to be the hardest choice for them in this time of crisis. The sadness was palpable. They cannot see or touch their loved ones. They can only hear their voice when they call home. “They are struggling at home. I cannot send them money,” a labourer staying in a relief camp said.
The relief camps house males and females separately, even husbands and wives. But they are making new friends there as life goes on.
The camps have managers who keep them engaged and ensure that the best of services are given to them. Sports often become the mode of bonding with strangers and relieving stress.
Besides loneliness, these daily wage earners lodged in camps are anxious about their families and their future. The sudden joblessness has made them mentally weak and they are fighting every moment to get over it. They need to because they have to.
As I write this piece, I have come to understand that beauty is not about sophistication but it lies in the eyes of the hungry and in the heart-rending stories of people whose lives take a turning point amid the pandemic.
The homeless have finally found home. Before the pandemic, they were unnoticed by the government and barely anyone paid heed to them.
Listening to their stories made me realise how heartless society is. When asked what drove them to the streets, their answers would be, “My parents passed away when I was very young”, “My stepmother ill-treated me”, “I do not want to go back home, they are too poor”. The irony.
We grumble about the hard life, made harder these days by the lockdown, but we can still go back home to feel the warmth of our beds and the softness of our pillows. But these men and women have nowhere to seek comfort.
These hapless people surprised me more than once. The hardships did not make them violent towards the privileged or give them a vile attitude. They were nice and warm, answering our questions with no emotion in their voice but deep down, I could feel that every word they spoke was with great pain. A widow who was left in the streets by her in-laws said, “I see my kids from afar. The eldest knows me but not the other two.”
Love thy neighbour
On a visit to Mawryngkneng, a lady who owns a store, said, “How can we bear to see my neighbour sleep hungry? I cannot see that happen right before my eyes.”
She said though her shop has no supplies of rice or any other essential item. She had gone to Shillong but came back empty-handed. Yet, her benevolence was natural.
What baffles me all the time is the audacity of some people who allow the left hand to know what the right hand is doing. Right hand: “I will distribute some blankets and rice to the poor.” Left hand: “Make sure you get the camera angle right. Make sure you get the statements right.”
Kudos to the unsung heroes who do not blow trumpets. As for public representatives, it is their duty to help people, it is their mandate, in fact they have made a promise. Trust me, dear MLAs/MDCs you will get elected with the blessings of people even without publicity. I still remember the faces of the residents of a slum standing in queue to get their food. A man was unable to speak but his eyes said it all.
There are people struggling, there are many who are deciding whether to skip dinner or lunch. And there are some who are dreading the threat of the virus and venturing out to ensure no one sleeps hungry.
No, there is still hope to overcome this dark phase of humanity. So what if it is only a speck in this world full of consumerism, corruption and selfishness. So what if many do not see it. So what if uncertainty looms large. These people whom the society neglects see it and so they get the strength to fight against any adversity. They survive and they will because they have survived for centuries.
Photo by ST