The Obsolete Swimmer and the Two Streams of Survival

January 18, 2008

Earlier there was almost no choice for me. Haryana Civil Service, HCS, appeared to be the end and beginning of the world.

But following the principles of bad politics, Mr. Hooda still did me a favour. He untethered me from this painful peg in the ground.

In one sudden, surprising, off-balancing strike, he got this dog's bone—which can't be chewed, can't be thrown away—out of my bleeding jaws.

Though thunderstruck by this injustice, yet it was relieving in the sense that from now onwards no sham play of justice will continue, and the fact that justice is the ever-obelizing courtesan of the powerful politicians is proven clearly for all to see.

This jolt was rewarding in another sense as well. Its boiling, furious waters forced the wormy myself out of the archaic cocoon.

So, frowning with pain, bleeding body, I came out under the mercilessly glaring sun of exploding realities.

There was no make-believe, pseudo-sense of getting my job through the presumed uprightness of the judiciary at the apex level.

All I was required to do was to get into the hurtling waves of the mighty stream of survival as an obsolete old swimmer.

But I have surprised even myself in tackling the first waves crashing in my face questioningly.

In the month since that hyperactive crash-landing, after that three-year-long futile fight with the help of imaginary judicial wings, I have created two opportunities for myself: that of a content writer with the web portals providing software solutions, and that of a business adventure in East Africa.

But it seems too much for my historically choiceless self.

I am in two minds. In the seesaw battle of these two choices, their gleam fluctuates intermittently, making one or the other appear attractive.

Me, Sandeep, Sajjan, Anil and Shekhar have set up the system for the scrap business at the painful cost of our meagre resources, and just when the movement for importing iron scrap from Djibouti landed down, we find ourselves running out of money to start the export-import cycle.

I went to Ludhiana to meet Babu, who had purchased our first iron scrap container. I was able to convince him to invest in order to provide an ignition spark of capital.

Babu and his brother-in-law, in turn, appear to agree to visit the place to take stock of the material and offer us some terms of partnership.

So, as I have written earlier as well, we are planning to visit Africa.

I took Babu and his brother-in-law to the embassy for their visa processing.

The Embassy of Djibouti is situated in the semi-attractive surroundings of Bhikaji Cama Place, near Safdarjung Enclave and Vasant Vihar.

It is a small, two-storeyed block without the usual hustle-bustle of visa seekers. The flag lies limply.

It is eerily quiet in the reception hall. Two ladies, the younger behind the computer, the older at the table dealing with visa procedures, do their work in a relaxed manner without being pursued by the tactically lolloping tongues of foreign-visit-aspiring applicants, like you have in the embassies of developed countries.

As you open the heavy wooden door into the reception hall, you can at the most expect to meet another visa seeker there on the sofa.

The Djiboutian national sits in his usual aloofness and sense of loneliness. He is a handsome, dark man. He ponders over the magazines about his country and spends his time silently.