Goodbye 2020, and don't come back

2020 is finally drawing to a close. Virtually every human being will agree that it has been a year like no other in living memory: much worse, even, than the years of world war, I think, because the vast majority of humankind then went on with business as usual, and did not stay cooped up at home in mortal fear, though they knew that tens of millions, no, hundreds, were dying or becoming maimed for life, or destitute, or losing loved ones. It has been tumultuous, infinitely wearisome, difficult and utterly disorienting – on that, too, most people would agree. A relatively small number have also enjoyed it hugely, one way or the other (it is incredible how many people can actually be quite content staying at home doing virtually nothing other than chores for months on end!) and even made sudden huge fortunes or reputations (like ‘experts’ whom nobody had ever heard about before crawling out of the woodwork to luxuriate in their moment under the sun spewing every kind of nonsense and insanity to fuel and sustain the panic). I shall not make a survey of the thoughts of vast swathes of mankind here, though, only put on record bits and pieces of my own experience and reflection.

I experienced early (semi-) retirement. It has been enough for the rest of my lifetime. I have vowed to keep working till my dying day hereafter, so help me God.

The single bit of joyous good luck that I revelled in was that circumstances allowed me, after many years, to spend five whole months with my daughter in three installments: something that only a ‘pandemic’ could have arranged at this stage of our lives. I shall be ever grateful for it.

I was also, thanks to learning about how to conduct ‘online classes’, somewhat freed from the iron shackles of routine that had bound me tightly for three decades: as I have noted before, I shall always stay in touch with my pupils via the internet in future, so that there would be no serious interruption of studies even when I take it into my head to make quick, short and unplanned getaways.

I was even more deeply embittered about the mass of mankind that surrounds me than I had become over a long working life, as I gradually found out how many people – parents of students – are shameless frauds, and will cheat a teacher of his fees after taking advantage of all he has done for their children for months on end. This, after I had voluntarily reduced fees and accommodated every single parent who talked about difficulties by telling them to pay only partially at long intervals. Since I was not keeping tabs and not forcing them to pay regularly online (not having imagined that this absurd shutdown of the entire educational sector would continue for so long, nor that so many people could be so disgustingly dishonest), I was taken for a ride by many ‘clever’ folk. Thank God there were many others of the decent sort, who have supported me loyally all through these difficult times, so that I tided over the crisis without any really serious financial hardship. I do wish we lived in a country where the old, old rule dushter domon ar shishter palon (suppression of the wicked and nurturing of the good) was imposed with an iron hand. I am also truly glad that a lot of parents, and even some students, the more interested and sincere among them at least, are beginning to agree with me that exclusively online studies just do not work over any length of time.

I went travelling to Bangalore and met up with a few old boys back in February. I mention this because it seems to have happened in another time and place…

My daughter had just started on her first job when, after seven months, the lockdown began. Ever since then she has been working from home. She and her contemporaries are going to have a very different experience of life than our generation, that is a dead cert. I hope they cope well.

Pupu has said that their entire circle of friends have decided to forget 2020 once and for all when the new year dawns. It would be nice if that pledge can be kept. I shall look forward with a vengeance to the return of normalcy in 2021. And since everything else has more or less opened up, from tourism to transport, from malls to gyms, from factories to beauty parlours, I shall pray that the schools and colleges too would open up, and soon.

Pupu is twenty four today. Quite the grown up woman. Have a very happy birthday ma. It’s been many years since we were apart on this day. I wish you godspeed with all your enthusiasms and endeavours in the year ahead. Above baba, there is only God, and may He dispose generously.

Pandemic, indeed!

Ten times more people died prematurely in India owing to pollution-related health issues in 2019 than fell victim to the so-called coronavirus epidemic this year. Remind me: was anything shut down nationwide for any length of time to avoid that scourge?

Look up this link before it is taken off the Net.

Digha, four years later

I might not be Rabindranath, but I am peripatetic enough: stuck for a few months in my house and town, I get breathless. So I announced a three-day break and took my mother along on another trip to Digha on the 16th, almost four years since I last visited with Pupu in January 2017.

I won’t write a travelogue here, because my daughter did that already in 2017, and we virtually visited the same places over again. I shall instead make a few remarks on the changes I noticed, especially in this (almost) post-pandemic season.

The road is good, even excellent, in patches, but there are long stretches where it is narrow, or in poor condition, or simply too congested, passing as it does through little market towns where people neither know nor care about traffic rules, their only catch-all solution when there is an accident being to beat up the driver of the bigger vehicle if they can catch him. There were two heart-in-mouth moments, one on the journey outwards, when a man thumbed down a bus and suddenly ran across the road, entirely oblivious of the traffic, and our car missed him by an inch or two, and once on the way back, when a truck tyre blew up right in our faces while both vehicles were going at high speed. The blast was a real shocker, and it’s a wonder that our windscreen remained intact. The trucker went on driving unconcerned, he having 15 or 17 wheels to spare, but we stopped briefly to take deep breaths, and some bystanders came running over to check whether we were okay. Google was quite right in predicting that the average driving time each way would be six hours and a half, but given better road conditions throughout, it can be done in an hour less with far less anxiety.

We put up at the renovated Tourist Lodge this time, and it was good for the price overall – much better than most private hotels in the same tariff range – though the food, which is very good, is rather overpriced. The secure parking and the lush garden were part of the bonus. If you prefer to eat out – there are cheap eateries aplenty within a stone’s throw – this might just be the best place to stay. You cross the road, take a hundred steps, and you are on the beach.

Digha is swarming with happy holiday makers, and for once I did not even mind the noise. We were told that it would be still more crowded during the weekend, and even more so during the year-ending holiday week. Good to see that a lot of people have decided enough is enough, and gone travelling with family and friends. We heard sad stories galore about how badly business had been hit all through March to September, including one from a smart and affable young man selling tea on Mohona beach, who lives in nearby Contai, used to work as a cook in Mumbai, came home at great expense and trouble during the lockdown, and still cannot see any prospects in venturing back. So I am truly glad that things are getting back to normal again, and I curse all those who not only stayed at home all through the year but were quite happy that they could eat well, the rest of the world be damned. My moral sights have become very clear: the biggest problem with the world today is that there are far too many people who can not only afford to ignore the misery of others but even pontificate about how everybody should emulate them. Ministers, doctors, journalists, pensioners, or rentiers, they are fundamentally sick, and bad for all the rest of us who, for economic or mental health reasons, cannot ‘live’ (if that is called living) like them.

The Saikat Sarani walkway, not having been maintained for over a year, looks rather down in the mouth now: many structures could do with repair, replacement or at least a fresh coat of paint. New Digha has become overcrowded with hotels. The entire beachfront from New Digha to Oceania Park to Udaipur was a treat for sore eyes, but we liked best the Mohona point (where we saw gigantic lobsters on sale, along with a huge variety of seafood) and Tajpur, which – besides Mandarmoni – has the only extensive sandy beach available, all the others having been dumped with boulders and laid out with concrete to prevent the sea eroding away everything. Lunch with freshly caught pomfret (when will Bengalis learn to pronounce it correctly?) on the beach was a moment to remember, and we lazed around till almost sunset, watching the white light slowly mellowing to golden and then red, and the horizon vanishing from sight… ma was content, too, because she had not visited these sites the last time she was here, back in 2013, she told me. Dad and she had come to Digha to mark a quiet golden jubilee.

When we were strolling on Digha beach at 9 p.m., it was still crowded with tourists and vendors selling an incredible variety of snacks and knick knacks. The lights twinkling form the trawlers far out at sea gave me a very strange feeling: this is one of those very, very rare cases when I am at a loss for words! Believe it or not, we had to use the ceiling fan at night (after pulling on a blanket, though) in mid-December.

We returned in the afternoon of the third day, yesterday. The class in the evening had rather more pupils than usual, because I had punched classes together, and they were all in a chirpy mood, happy to see friends after a long time, having had to make do with the incredibly tedious and lonely ‘online studies’ nonsense for so many months on end. I was deliberately lenient with them, so we had a little less of studies than usual, but the happiness going around was well worth it.

I’ll see later whether there are some worthwhile photos to put up.

P.S.: Last night, 18th December again, it suddenly became very cold. Weird coincidence this, the very same day as last year!

Two eternally favourite poems

 ... in my own voice.

The first, Dushsomoy (Dark Times) by Tagore,

and the second,

Crossing the bar, by Tennyson.