[Reader-list] Of differences between India and China

[Zainab Bawa]

China does not have the problem of democracy that we have
   
  It was sometime in the month of June. At 10:30 PM, I was waiting at Dadar for a BEST bus to get home. Quiet, lonely, just a few people around. There was no bus in sight. 
   
  I leaned against the bus stop. On the footpath were several shops, all shut at this hour. Outside the Bata Shoe Shop, an old man and an old woman were setting up their bedding. They were pavement dwellers. They sat chatting once the bedding was up. They were very old and perhaps very, very poor. About ten minutes later, a man on his bicycle came up on the footpath. He stopped at the bedroom of the old man and the old woman. On his bicycle was a steel filter. This man was a traveling tea seller. He stopped by the old man and old woman and handed them out a cup of tea each. The couple then brought out a piece of bread each and dunked it in the tea. Perhaps it was their dinner. The tea seller chatted with them for a bit with and went away. The couple blessed him as he was leaving.
   
  Last night I was walking from Mazagaon to Byculla to get to home. I passed by what I thought were the familiar streets of Love Lane, but they did not seem so familiar yesterday.
   
  As I entered Love Lane from Mazagaon, I found several hawkers who had spread out clothes and things to sell on plastic sheet. A little ahead was a man, obviously struck by a schizophrenia seated on his knees, staring at the ground and oozing out saliva as if there were a fountain stored in him. A few meters ahead were stray hawkers selling peanuts and bhel puri. Further down I saw a swank new Sahkari Bhandar store which was never there earlier. One side of the road in Love Lane is under repair. The laborers who are here, working on the road repair have set up their tents and there are preparations being made for dinner. One aspect of poverty lives in my face. On the other side of the road is a huge garbage dump with an overflowing municipal rubbish bin.
   
  Further down there is a sense of quiet. Here are the upper middle class buildings where Bohra, Marwari and Gujarati residents reside. Ahead there is a gutter burst open and sewage is flowing. The Udupi restaurant is well lit and abuzz and people are walking in and out of it. A little ahead of the Udupi restaurant, a man is asleep on the pavement. His beard his thick and there are tinges of white on it. His face is flush with calm and restful sleep. 
   
  The regular coconut seller is dumping the left over coconuts in a steel box. This space is now permanently occupied by him ever since I have known him. The flower seller by the wall of the street has already packed up and left. The road repairs have intensified further up towards the end of Love Lane. The sandwich fellow is also packing up his stall. Another development is the painted picture of the Shirdi Sai Baba which has been framed on the wall along the street. It has now become a semi-shrine where people have started throwing coins. A little down a Muslim wedding is taking place and usual flower seller is making business selling exotic bouquets. On the opposite side of the road is the Shiv Sena Shakha office.
   
  I have nearly reached the Byculla police station after which I turn into the lane to go home. The police station is lit up and there is a Hindu prayer ceremony taking place in the police quarters. A woman is sitting on the pavement. Asleep a little ahead is her man and at his feet is their child. At the child’s feet is one shoe which is meant for a child and a lady’s shoe. I don’t know if this is an irony of some sort.
   
  This evening, a dear friend of mine tells me of Nandan Nilekani’s interview he recently watched on television. Thom Friedman, the interviewer, asked Nilekani what is the difference between India and China. Nilekani replied saying that China does not have the problem of democracy which India has. 
   
  My word!


Zainab Bawa 
Mumbai 

www.xanga.com/citybytes

 __________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20061225/528a5d1e/attachment.html