My daughter and I went out for a drive today.
Actually we took a cycle to a repair shop. A routine task
that seemed so much like an adventure. That is what four and half months of
living in a tower does to you.
Driving in Bangalore traffic has been my favourite crib for
years. I drove a car after four and half months today.
The change was spooking me out!
The car felt strange and wobbly. No, I had not forgotten to
drive. One of the tyres had slumped in, bearing the weight of the car that
barely moved for weeks. So I had to go and the tyre fixed too. Another human to
interact with! That human too wore a mask and moved away as I stepped out to
check if there was a puncture. In this altered planet we are all so afraid of
each other.
It took some time to get used to, but the change was
everywhere. People stood further away from each other. They pulled their masks
on when they saw others approaching, they handled cash gingerly, and they were
all conscious that the invisible enemy could be lurking anywhere. More than
half the shops were closed, the ones that were open, had hardly any customers.
This in a locality filled with pubs, cafes and restaurants, where there was
sometimes no place to drive, let alone park on a weekend afternoon.
The world had changed so much in a few months.
What had not changed were the roads. Piles of garbage had been dredged out and placed right next to the drains, for the next shower to take them in again. A third of the road remained unusable because of the unfinished surface after the previous digging and the next strip of road was roped in for new digging.
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