Blank Book

Year �" 2002

 

There had been days when I was sitting workless, wondering �" whether I would get this free time ever again, whether these free hours will ever come back to me. Soon, I started pondering over it, realizing that my mind demanded an actual conclusion. I had none. So, I kept on thinking, talked about it one of my friends, who knew me very well, he didn’t have an answer to my question. All he said was �"”How can I say if you’d have so much of free time ever again?” Having such unhelpful friends is such a pain in the a*s; still, I needed an answer to that. I hadn’t done anything the summer vacation, almost nothing, except helping my mother making some cookies. After helping my mother, I started feeling extremely useless, not because I had a sexist mentality, but I felt as if I was not worth doing anything. Was I? I doubted myself.

 

Normally, I had seen people doing extra-curriculum activities like learning swimming, learning how to play guitar, dance and whatnot. I was too stiff to do any of these. I had realized it long back and this summer vacation was nothing, but a warm reminder (formally) and punch on my face (that I was good for nothing). I wouldn’t have stressed out if this lust of wanting to do something wouldn’t have been there in me. It’d have been quite different, but it wasn’t. I really wanted to do something this summer and all my time was passing in deciding what to do, no good ideas were coming in my mind, and lastly, I ended up sleeping, dreaming about challenges people were undertaking whereas I was lying on my bed with this strange desire of doing something mind-boggling. Finally, I had decided to do something. I decided to do the best thing anyone would ever choose to do �" Travel. I decided to go to a hill station alone.

 

A few days later, my bags were packed and I was about to leave for my first ever solo trip to a hill station named �" Almora. It was in the state of Uttarkhand. Even before I could leave, I felt things were going to be different because on the way to the railway station, my mother gave me a metal locket, in which God’s picture was engraved. She told me to keep it near me whenever I went out for sightseeing. So, I began my first solo journey. I couldn’t tell if anyone in my family was happy, but I was immensely satisfied that I had some activity to do. To explore something new, an opportunity to meet new people, and entirely different experience.

Next Day

1 0 P.M

 

I entire journey went by noticing the darkness from the train window because my father had told me to sleep during the daytime as reaching Almora by train was not possible for me. Due to summer vacation rush, all the tickets were already booked, so that’s why I had to take a longer route to reach my destination. I had to catch a night bus to reach there from a nearby station and bus would reach Almora by six in the morning.  That was fine by me, now as I had slept the entire day. As planned, I caught the bus, and it was on its way toward Almora. I checked out the crowd, it was decent, indicating there weren’t any thieves in the bus. I blinked my eyes before closing them and as I closed them, I felt I was falling. A second later, I realized I was not the only one who was falling, it was the entire bus. I slipped down toward a woman, I tried to catch one of the seats, but everyone was literally sliding down. Before slumping down in darkness, I looked upward, but was unable to see anything, but darkness. That’s how I felt at that moment. I felt I was floating in darkness.

 

Four days later

At hospital

 

I didn’t know I was unconscious until I opened my eyes and saw an old couple staring me. When you open your eyes after a good amount of sleep, you feel it. I felt the same when I opened up eyes, everything felt fresh and new. Fact: it was. But, I wondered why? I tried to remember the last thing I saw �" I couldn’t recall anything. For now, I thought leaving that aside would be fine owing to the fact that an unknown face wearing a white coat was asking if I remembered what my name was. I answered �" of course I remember my name, it is Harsh. Then he asked if I remembered any of my relative’s number or my parents mobile number, which could help him contact them? I couldn’t recall anything. I never memorized anyone’s number, not even mine. Before he could ask me any other question, I asked him what really happened to me. He enlightened me �" the bus I was travelling in encountered an accident and I was suffered from a severe leg fracture. I asked him �" where I was? He told me �" I was in a government hospital in Khatoli. Further questioning got me all my answers. I was in Khatoli, which was a village near Almora and I had been one of those 1 0 survivors from the accident. After calculation, by this time, I thought my parents would be reaching in Almora anytime soon to rescue me from this goddamn place. Ignoring my pain, I had been thinking a lot because mental pain is bigger than physical one. That is how I had always interpreted it. Maybe I was right.

 

I looked around and saw the condition of the hospital I was been treated at was shoddy. I rotated my eyes balls, looking at unpainted dirty walls around me, untidy floors, and nearly everything I could see was substandard. Even the t-shirt I was wearing, I felt had not been washed for a while. It felt yucky. While I was observing everything, I saw the old couple was still sitting beside my bed on a plastic stool each. I thought why they were still sitting here. So, without thinking too much, I asked them if they had any work. Both of them looked at me, with expressionless faces. I again asked them the same question. Still they looked at me, clueless. Considering the pain I was in, I decided to give up on them and let them do what they wanted to.

 

A few hours later, Police (cops) arrived. As I expected, they were trying to gain as much as information from me regarding where I live, who were my parents, my home address and so on. I gave them the required information and they told me, they would be contacting my parents ASAP. I thanked them and closed my eyes, remembering what the last thing I saw before passing out? I couldn’t see anything, but blankness. Awhile, I saw both the oldies talking with each other in a different language. I preconceived it was their regional language. I didn’t care about them anymore. All I wanted to was to get out of this f*****g hospital, where nothing seemed to be right. I couldn’t imagine lying on this s****y creaky bed for four days and I was still lying here, helplessly. Suddenly, I saw doctor calling both the oldies. They both went and brought the dinner for me. This time I was totally puzzled. Why were they helping me? Why?

 

Later that night, I learnt they lost their only child (son) in a car accident and since then they had not been able to recover. They had lost someone whom they would never get back and they never wished to see anyone feeling the pain they had felt. This was a part of the tragedy I was luring into. They both were uneducated and didn’t know any other language except for their regional language. Doctor also said that sometimes they want to help someone, but because of the language being a barrier they are helpless. After listening to their sad story, I obviously felt bad for them and I wanted to give something back to them, something which could stay with them for lifetime. Initially, I was confused, but soon I took my decision. Well, next day, my mother and father came and met me. They were ready to shift me to a better hospital, but I refused I told them I was comfortable here. My mother met that couple, but unfortunately they couldn’t communicate.

 

I decided I would teach them our (India’s) national language �" Hindi. When I started, they couldn’t understand anything, almost nothing. But later nurses helped me make them understand �" how I was going to teach them and how they should interpret it. At first, they struggled a lot, with simple alphabets (HINDI) and I used to sometimes laugh at them when they mispronounced an alphabet or a word. Later my mother also joined in and helped me teach them. What I taught, they taught people who met them, and they also started visiting me to learn from me. But after all it was a hospital and not more than five people at a time could sit near my bed and learn. So, I gave them homework and I thought like me they wouldn’t do homework, but my prediction was wrong. They did their homework and asked for more. By the end of an entire month, they had learned basics of Hindi language and they were able to read and write simple words and phrases, not because I was an awesome teacher, it was because of that Urge to LEARN.

 

Soon, my leg got better and my college was also going to start soon, so I had to leave that village. It wasn’t me, who taught those uneducated village people. It was them, who taught me, how to not let that desire to do something epic die ever. I spent most of my summer vacation, wasting time on thinking what I should do. And nothing really struck me; it was spinning in my head, but going nowhere. But that’s how it is. Now I remember the last thing I saw before knocking out �" it was �" nothing.

 

After I returned home, I thought a lot about that accident and how bad it was for some people (because they lost their lives) and how life changing it is for some people who got a chance to learn. I never knew that there were people out in INDIA, who didn’t know how to talk in our national language and how much they were struggling, not just to live their own life, but helping others. I always thought the people who care about you are your family and friends, but what about that old couple who sat there for four days near me? You’d wonder why? They saw their son in me and their tragic story related to mine. I’d have died that night in the accident, maybe I just did not. Well, this may sound a bit absurd, but it’s that powerful feeling of wanting something so badly that even the creator of this world doesn’t have the heart to snatch it away from you. Like I had this lust of wanting to do something and I ended up doing something very unusual than others. But I did something and I think I want to do it my entire life.

“Now I aspire to be a teacher because there are many blank books to be filled.”

 

Letter to the readers from the author

 

Firstly, I want to tell you guys, I wrote this story in just 2 hours, so please ignore all the silly mistakes. Secondly, this is not a story about the condition of people, who’re residing at rural areas. I chose to tell the story in such a way that eventually, you guys realize that it’s the urge to do something magnificent, keeps us going. Well, somewhere we know it’s kind of true that there are people in this country that still can’t read and write and they struggle a lot in their daily lives, and that’s a depressing reality.

But that’s where fiction comes into play, gives people hope, by telling life-changing stories (not mine, of course) and gifting them the power to face the truth.

This is all I wanted to say, I hope you enjoyed the story.  

 

Thank-you, 

Amay Saxena!