Wow !!
What a lovely evening it is. Look at the sky, I never noticed that even in
Karachi the sky can be so clear and yes it’s blue. Look the scattered clouds on sky and the sun hiding behind them and this cool sea breeze, what a blessing it is.
It was though an ordinary Sunday of March but only a young cadet on short leave can have such feelings for a weather in which he had been living from his childhood. Stagnant weather of
Karachi never charmed any one except the cadets of naval academy who proceed on short leave on Sundays. So even if you will find a cadet roaming around in scorching sun light on a short leave, he will tell you the same lines that how charming the life is out here.
It was his first short leave after forty days of intense hard training and he did his best to qualify his preliminary swimming and saluting test to get this short leave. Few hours out of naval academy were like he was suddenly in heaven out of hell.
“
Independence is such a blessing”
Uttering these words he went down stairs, out of his home.
“I guess having ice cream in such an evening would be a great idea”.
He went off to a near by medical and general store. Al-shifa medical and general store was little extra crowdie today. Since his child hood he had this basic instinct of staring and exploring things. But in that store there was something different today. There were signs of worries on his fore head, his big black eyes never narrowed with such anxiety.
“YA ALLAH”
These were the only words which came to his mind at that moment. There were around 15-20 people of different age group in that medical store, busy in for what they were there but he was amazed that no one noticed what he did.
“so we call our selves as human beings, may be robots are better then us”
He thought
May be what he was seeing was quite normal, something very ordinary, But not for him.
She was bare foot, wearing black large chaddar which was torn out from different places but still her face and head was covered.
“she is coughing very severely, but why is she out then if she is so much ill”
her eyes, how hurting it was to look at them. At times you really find your heart heavy and painful, pain just not for writing but the real pain. His heart was heavy and yes he felt pain in it just because he had a glance at those eyes telling a long story of suffering and misery.
……………..
Her plight was quite evident form her face but at the same time she appeared to be quite timid.
“Shall I ask her for any help which in case I may rent to her?”
“No, I guess she belongs to that breed of human beings who can die in hunger but their self respect never allows them to go out and scream for help”
Her young child was constantly pulling her Kurta and was constantly projecting his hands towards the giant fridge of drinks, uttering in a low, innocent and mournful voice
“ami ….juice …..ami …ami ”
His voice slowly died out, the silence of her mother made him clear that his desire will not be fulfilled.
“That is not for us, it has been made for the ruthless and rich bunch of people around you”
He thought she wanted to say this to her child but he was too young to understand that human beings have classes …and they belong to the poor class.
But he could overlook the tears in the eyes of that young child. He quickly went across to the counter and whispered to Qasim bhai.
“Qasim bhai what ever that women takes, charge her only with 25% of the money and give her a packet of juice with a gesture that its free with the medicine you took”
For an instance Qasim bhai gave him a weird look
“Obviously am going to pay the rest, don’t worry for that”
He started following her. It was not something he was doing intentionally, he even didn’t have any reason for what he was doing, but still he couldn’t stop himself. His feet seem to be no more under his control.
It was a long walk.
“She has got nice stamina, I wonder how am going to go back”
They crossed different streets, they turned many rights, many lefts, crossed many intersections
“Shit I lost my north”
He didn’t know in which direction they were going. This colony where ever they were was quite randomly constructed. He was quite badezelled by the way the people were living in that place.
At last she stopped in front of a small corroded steel gate and went inside.
“She didn’t even lock her home”
Locks serve to people who have homes, and this structure does not seem to be one.
Every inch of that place added to her grief-stricken condition, though the place was not more then few inches. Dirt and filth around the corroded steel gate added to the misery of that place.
He lifted his right hand to knock the door.
“But what am I going to do”
He kept standing there, still thinking.
Suddenly he noticed that the sun had completely dawned and his surrounding was as dark as the life in that place. He looked at the narrow passage which he had followed to come to that place.
“I don’t have much time, short leave will expire in next couple of hours and I have a boat to catch”
While standing at Kemari jetty waiting for his boat he thought that there are hundreds of such stories around us, thousands of such young women with dreadful tales of lives and millions of young children dying of hunger.
“Despite of all this, life never stops”
Boat from Pakistan naval academy left the jetty after the cadets hastened into it. It was again heading back towards the academy. After all
“Life has to go on ”
LEARN AND LIVE
