Everyone stumbles on writer’s blocks, and I am no exception. However, I keep collecting the blocks and try building on them, as a child would do with Lego blocks. The results never matter as the wind blows them away soon as soon as I finish writing.
Covid is amongst us; in a stage, none can predict. Some say the community spread has begun, and some others maintain that it is yet to begin and will peak after another two months. I had an eyewitness account of a neighbour’s travails. There were suddenly some frenzied activities in the middle of the night, usually from the normally quiet house, moving an elderly lady in an ambulance. Anyone could be sick, and not necessarily all patients need to be Covid affected. I slept off.
The next morning, I am confronted by two masked KMC health department, who say that there is a Covid patient in our building and that rest ‘actions’ as per ‘protocol’ must be followed. Non-intrusive nature is one of the sufferings of urban living, often one resident not knowing the other in the same building. Residents thinking that a proverbial ‘giant-sized latex sheath covers our building,’ came to terms, the Secretary issuing a plethora of orders, barring entry and exit of all. I stay stunned at my cancelled appointments for the day and return to spend the rest of the day explaining the case with every punctuation to my ever worrisome and inquisitive wife.
Soon the dreadful thing happened. A few arrive in a vehicle adorning the scary PPEs, carrying sanitization equipment et al. They engulfed our building in a cloud of distasteful mist, bursting the ego and self-confidence of each one of the resident in the building, who believed that Covid is for others and not for themselves, I included!
Soon the wail of a siren died at our gate, as all heads from the many balconies of our building showed up like the cuckoos from the clocks. The PPE clad men did not clumsily clamour out of their ambulance like the sanitizing staff but would take the swabs of suspected spread cases from the special holes provided in the vehicle. Each one from the affected flat walked down to give the tests as the dwellers from the nearby slum turn up with alacrity. The process took a while due to several dwellers even as the news spread faster than the assassination of Indira Gandhi’s, 35 years ago.
The worst now unfolded. The men ‘para dadas’ in local parlance, set forth conditions more critical than the Covid advisories of either WHO or the predictably unpredictable State Health department.
The reports of all come negative as all heaved a sigh of relief, not necessarily because of a good health feeling for all, but that normal life, going out to workplace and shops can resume unhindered for the others. Untouchables become touchable once again!
The Express Astro forecast today states, ‘your most helpful planets indicate that you’re about to reach a major turning point.’ Even before I finish my read, my wife from the kitchen calls, as I turn my head even without finishing my reading, there it is stuck! How true the predictions could be!
Enjoy your Sunday!
Sampath Kumar
Intrépide Voix
Pic: courtesy Outlook Gallery
