A Little Homeless Girl

 

On my way to office, there is a portion of road besides which some homeless people live by having made a make-shift tent-house and they sell a host of items (mainly toys) to the passersby. As rains have started, today while I was passing by, I noticed half a dozen kids of around 6-7 years of age making a loud sales pitch and selling “mudguards” for motorcycles. As I ignored them and passed by, suddenly a scene captured my attention.

There was a small girl of about 6-7 who had collected a big dusty blanket on her head and she was shouting in anger. It seemed as if someone from her family had asked her to gather the blanket but had not told her where to keep it; and as she had already gathered the heavy blanket over her head, she was shouting and asking where to keep it, as she did not have the energy to keep it on ground and to pick it up again after figuring it out. This idea that such a homeless poor little girl would also shout in anger at her parents startled me a bit.

It is a whole different topic about why kids shout angrily at their parents; but the poor little girl doing the same thing in a way comforted me that she was having a normal childhood, and all was not lost. Of course, she was able to do it only if her parents had given her the right to do so, meaning she was loved by them and well taken care of. This is hardly a conclusion which could be made merely by going through the scene, but I am convinced that it is what it is.

- Rahul

 

Poor and Dishonest?

I went to her to get my slippers mend. She was a cobbler sitting on the road side of a location on the outskirts of Hyderabad. I guessed the price for the job would be Rs 10, or maximum 15. I haven’t seen much variation in cobbler’s charges across India. It was Mumbai first where I saw lady-cobblers; otherwise the job belongs to men in much of North India. I thought the job was slightly less demanding especially when you have a reserved small shop on the foot-path, and hence the trend would be for men to have more demanding jobs and women to occupy their place – at least in the cities. Anyways, she was doing her job and something was going on in my mind. Those days I was trying to find means to do something for the poor. I wondered if I should offer her a hundred rupee note. What if she used it to buy alcohol for herself? Should I ask her if she had young children in school and then help her with something specifically for them? My chain of thoughts got a break when I heard, “Rs 25”. What? “Rupee 25 is too much. Take Rs 10; it should be fair.”

To my surprise, she protested strongly. She started explaining about the job done which I showed to her was not much. Still, I gave her Rs 20. She said she won’t leave the remaining Rs 5. Then she commented something interesting, “You people come from UP (Uttar Pradesh) to Hyderabad and want to dictate me what should be the charge?” So it was about exploiting the “outsiders”? I got angry and asked her why she was bringing “UP” in between? If she asked Rs 100 for the job, should I give it to her only because I came from outside Hyderabad? She took a backseat hearing this. By the time two other ladies had also come to the shop and they became uncomfortable, perhaps thinking if they would also be charged exorbitantly. Anyways, I left her place after saying that I won’t give more than 20 and she could do whatever she wanted. Moments before leaving, I gave her a last glance and bewildered because I saw a “fun” in her eyes. May be such demands and encounters were “regular” for her.

Should I have given in to her demand? After all, Rs 5 or Rs 25 was not a big sum! I know that most of the street vendors are poor, but am I wrong if I expect a bit of integrity from them? And her comments on “you having come from UP” definitely gave the indication that she was treating me discriminately! Also, if people like me start giving her double the usual price, won’t she start demanding the same high price from the really poor customers too? That would be really bad. Anyways, I don’t know what I learnt from the experience, because such things happen many times in all places in this world. But one thing for sure: it broke my “charity bubble”.

- Rahul