Coming to terms

I was sure I would not do a ‘normal’ job. What is normal I can’t say for sure but have a general idea of how it works. Everyday, 9-5 you sit at a desk and put all your time and some of your effort to make sure that the manager meets their targets and the directors get their bonuses and the shareholders are happy. Far-fetched, but in everyday life it seems like a monotonous desk job with no real learnings, no self development for sure and a promise of exploitation, office politics and insults by superiors who think they are better than anyone else around. I’d say it is a matter of time and chance. Anyone can be on either side of the table.

Privilege is the best explanation. However, the system continues, players and critiques come and go but the game is eternal and we are all but slaves to it. After a year of working in the education sector in ahmedabad alongside preparation for ugc-net political science ( i appeared for it, was a good attempt I’d say, it was cancelled). I lost faith in almost everything. But I loved the people and had gotten ready to work and influence the social system for myself and a little for the community as well (sic). I was eager to work in the rural sector , interacting with the community, contributing to the cause with my knowledge and body. So I applied and was excited when I got into the Swar fellowship. We had a very basic idea of what it was going to be, the project, but I and I guess all of the fellows knew what was coming, on the life side of it. No idea about housing, food, water, drinking and bathing(need hot water), toilets ( not used to indian toilets), snakes, marginalized people, some respect from them, some disdain from the authorities, lethargy from the administration, a real impasse in the between, and some way out at the end. Hope something does come out in the end.

I reached Pune in the night. Night is my time. Day is when everyone is up. I can’t think then. Too much noise. Not like I am made for the nights. I suffer a lot due to my owl-like habits. Angry friends, lost opportunities that require just a little extra effort and some appearances, sleep deprivation. But that is when I do the thing I like the most. Write about how I feel and try to read what I don’t understand . Anyway, I checked in at 10:30 at Yashada. It is the training academy for civil servants of Maharashtra. How you give some exams and become a different class of citizen. Actually that’s when you become a citizen, the normal people live with jugad or as subjects. I couldn’t sleep for a while, till almost 3 am , then with great effort ( meditation) I managed to relax and was off to sleep. I thought I was lucky as almost all the other fellows had a sharing room whereas I had my own. At 4 am there was a knock on the door. The worst (not) was here. Christo came in, and started apologizing to the half asleep body across help. I said its fine but was really pissed at this, not knowing it wasn’t his choice. He could have come before me or after the day began, why now.

Turns out he had already started his thing in Tamil Nadu but things weren’t going right and he was flown in here by the organization. He came in and started making his clothes, items and bag for a while for god knows what reason and I accepted my fate, tried going back to sleep. He was quite gentle and wary of disturbing me unlike some of my previous roommates. I was awestruck by his conscience and consideration. We went on to share a vibe during the next 15 days and they turned out to be quite good, details are not necessary here I think. The first activity was obviously an introduction with a touch of summer school exercises. I am not a big fan of such events, after having seen faculties/ teachers who make students engage in such kinds of activities to instead skip the teaching part probably because they are really bad at their subject (my legal foundations & qualitative writing faculty in my post grad) . but as much as I had generalised the dislike for such instances, these were initially difficult to pull through but later turned out to be fine, in fact fun. They involved some sort of play as well, games, which I like. The post grad faculty could probably learn from these, and for the core subject content, they should go back to university. Moving on, but still on the ground, I couldn’t remember the faces or names, as is usual of the fellows and it usually takes days. I’ll not overstate that I did like it all and remembered their names and made friends with them at once, but this process was much smoother than in natural or previously prepared environments. And that is a good thing. Ahem. I almost broke my thumb during an activity which reminded me not to go all in at the first instance and I’m not here to prove anything to anyone. I did feel for a while if I was in the wrong place, but I knew I had to give it time. Over the course of time , it turned out to be eventful.

The room was pretty good, with a functioning ac and toilets and flush. That is already too much but that is what I need. Baaki sab chalta rehta hai. Christo had given up smoking and I still used to and was the only one, so we two clicked as is always the case with smokers, or I guess drinkers or any other people with the same habits. The food was good. And served often. The training sessions were lengthy, mentally strenuous but also forced us to self-reflect and I did. It did give me some clarity and conviction on why I was here and why I’ll continue. As Nietzsche or a made up quote on instagram says- One who has a why can survive all the hows or something like that. My why was existential. I guess whys are existential but mine was apparent to me after experiencing a void with respect to the meaning of my being, or being in general. Of course it didn’t say which sector and which job/fellowship to join, but gave me a purpose to dedicate my each ounce to the benefit of others, and this also is a selfish act, I want to give back to the society because it will make me full. Because I must. Because one must imagine sisyphus happy.

Everyone has to roll the stone up endlessly, or most people for most of the time, excluding the super rich, who make us do their rolling. I decided if I have to move and push sth heavy, I’ll also roll with it. So everything is packed with a bit of humor, satire for me and i just keep myself open to saying to myself “ waisa/aisa bhi hota hai”, and jo bhi hota hai wo kahi aur nahi, yaha hi, iss zindagi mai, humare saath hota hai. Nikita and Prashansa playfully insightful sessions helped us learn the world of development,of which I knew some parts, some I had to figure out. This made it all the more interesting. But this was perhaps the rosiest part perhaps , of the year. The next 15 days were intense as hell and we had to stretch through the day to make it past. No amount of coffee or morning stretches would help us post lunch. Only a proper early sleep helped.