Foray inside a dumpster
If I may borrow a phrase from a newly released movie, "A series of unfortunate events" yesterday got me to think that maybe, just maybe, life is full of sad memorable moments. The events...
I enter the movie theater. The rest of the group is already there (three times larger than I had expected). I choose to leave a seat between myself and the friend. It seems rude, so I get up and move closer but I just can't relax. I cannot smell the stink but I'm not sure others can't either. Moments later said friend offers me pizza, nicely wrapped in aluminum foil. I don't politely decline; I almost barf in disgust. I'm hoping the friend thinks of this as nothing more than that retarded quirkiness.
The movie is funny but that's not why I am half-laughing. It's because I am still getting over the fact that a few minutes ago I was searching for a half-inch SIM card at the bottom of a dumpster. A tiny sliver that I could see only because moments before that I had rushed into the theater in a complete state of frenzy and abruptly rushed out with the friend's phone. Some context may help here:
I'm done with work. It had been a long day and I was famished. Can't wait to get some dinner. Phone rings. Friend is having dinner. Great. So now I'm on my own. Fair enough. Can't say it wasn't expected. I take a slight detour. Since morning my mind had been on that pizza I had brought home from the night before. I can go home, grab the cold slice and be on my way to the theater with time to spare. Terry Gross had different plans, though. Her 'fresh-air' radio show had Rock critic Ken Tucker reviewing the top ten songs of the year. Usher's no. one hit, 'Yea!' is playing and all I can manage to do is sit outside my house -- immersed in listening.
Fast forward to the theater. I'm really late. I take my cell phone and the empty pizza box in one hand, keys in the other. It happened in a split second. I am running to the theater and with the dexterity of a portly baseball player, I throw the entire contents of my left hand in the open dumpster while still mantaining my pace. Metallic clunk. Then a thud. I stop as soon as my momemtum allows me to but the phone is not with me anymore.
I'm standing there with the friend's phone. It's useless. My cell phone is out of range inside the dumpster. Even from a foot away the stink is intolerable. I get on my toes and peek inside. The phone is not on the top from where I could more easily fetch it.
Where could the metallic clunk have occured? The top of the garbage heap doesn't show anything. I use the second phone's display as a search light. I must be lucky (you have to keep things in perspective here) since it was only a few minutes of searching and...Voila! It's sitting at the very bottom.
I carefully insert the other phone between my curved lips to shine some photons inside the dark garbage bin. With one leg on the ledge of an adjacent half-wall and one on the dumpster edge, I lift myself up, and quickly swing both legs right into the man-sized dumpster and top of a stack of garbage bags. It's soft. I sink a little. The stink decidedly worse. I'm trying not to breathe but the hands are shaky and legs wobbly. I'm afraid of losing grip on the second phone. I put it in my pocket and hunt for that that silvery back I'd noticed from outside in the dark recess of the garbage heap. I find something.
Crap. It is only the back cover.
Fortunately, only a few inches away was the dark outline of the front end. I hastily extract it from the wet layer at the bottom. It's over! Not really. The battery is missing. I throw the front and back parts into an empty cart lying adjacent to the dumpster. Battery, battery...where art thou?
Found it!
Split second later I'm out. Hands soiled but trousers nearly intact.
Crap, again. I am surprised to find myself mouthing outloud the f-word too.
The SIM card is missing. Without it, the phone is useless. I just managed to get a 250 dollar piece out of rubbish. The card can't be very far from where the other pieces were. I go back in. Himmat, guts, Fear Factor. A few Indians are walking by. Strange look in their eyes. I have no time for them. I have important things to do -- rummage through rubbish, for instance. The card is deeply ensconsed in the thick layer of wet dirt covering the floor . I pull it out -- it's damp and discolored. Probably won't work. All this for nothing.
Moments later, I'm in the bathroom of a nearby desi chat place, carefully assembling the pieces. Surprisingly, it does work. Actually, as I'm typing this, the phone is displaying an "insert SIM card" message - probably as a result of the dirt finally making its way to the innards of the circuit board. A reboot seems to help.) Ah, the face that graces my phone's display (Aishwarya) is back on, in its full glory.
Anyway, why am I writing this? I might be fussy about many matters but this is probably the closest I'll ever find myself in rubbish and I can't help but wonder that there are scavengers who do this daily. I'm not talking about birds or insects. These are human kids, in the prime of their childhood running through heaps of garbage to find those precious trinkets that can fetch them a few rupees to buy the next meal. We live a highly sanitized life here, no doubt. I am not saying that we should feel guilty about it but there is a whole world out there that lives on literally nothing, yet, it survives and prospers.
I enter the movie theater. The rest of the group is already there (three times larger than I had expected). I choose to leave a seat between myself and the friend. It seems rude, so I get up and move closer but I just can't relax. I cannot smell the stink but I'm not sure others can't either. Moments later said friend offers me pizza, nicely wrapped in aluminum foil. I don't politely decline; I almost barf in disgust. I'm hoping the friend thinks of this as nothing more than that retarded quirkiness.
The movie is funny but that's not why I am half-laughing. It's because I am still getting over the fact that a few minutes ago I was searching for a half-inch SIM card at the bottom of a dumpster. A tiny sliver that I could see only because moments before that I had rushed into the theater in a complete state of frenzy and abruptly rushed out with the friend's phone. Some context may help here:
I'm done with work. It had been a long day and I was famished. Can't wait to get some dinner. Phone rings. Friend is having dinner. Great. So now I'm on my own. Fair enough. Can't say it wasn't expected. I take a slight detour. Since morning my mind had been on that pizza I had brought home from the night before. I can go home, grab the cold slice and be on my way to the theater with time to spare. Terry Gross had different plans, though. Her 'fresh-air' radio show had Rock critic Ken Tucker reviewing the top ten songs of the year. Usher's no. one hit, 'Yea!' is playing and all I can manage to do is sit outside my house -- immersed in listening.
Fast forward to the theater. I'm really late. I take my cell phone and the empty pizza box in one hand, keys in the other. It happened in a split second. I am running to the theater and with the dexterity of a portly baseball player, I throw the entire contents of my left hand in the open dumpster while still mantaining my pace. Metallic clunk. Then a thud. I stop as soon as my momemtum allows me to but the phone is not with me anymore.
I'm standing there with the friend's phone. It's useless. My cell phone is out of range inside the dumpster. Even from a foot away the stink is intolerable. I get on my toes and peek inside. The phone is not on the top from where I could more easily fetch it.
Where could the metallic clunk have occured? The top of the garbage heap doesn't show anything. I use the second phone's display as a search light. I must be lucky (you have to keep things in perspective here) since it was only a few minutes of searching and...Voila! It's sitting at the very bottom.
I carefully insert the other phone between my curved lips to shine some photons inside the dark garbage bin. With one leg on the ledge of an adjacent half-wall and one on the dumpster edge, I lift myself up, and quickly swing both legs right into the man-sized dumpster and top of a stack of garbage bags. It's soft. I sink a little. The stink decidedly worse. I'm trying not to breathe but the hands are shaky and legs wobbly. I'm afraid of losing grip on the second phone. I put it in my pocket and hunt for that that silvery back I'd noticed from outside in the dark recess of the garbage heap. I find something.
Crap. It is only the back cover.
Fortunately, only a few inches away was the dark outline of the front end. I hastily extract it from the wet layer at the bottom. It's over! Not really. The battery is missing. I throw the front and back parts into an empty cart lying adjacent to the dumpster. Battery, battery...where art thou?
Found it!
Split second later I'm out. Hands soiled but trousers nearly intact.
Crap, again. I am surprised to find myself mouthing outloud the f-word too.
The SIM card is missing. Without it, the phone is useless. I just managed to get a 250 dollar piece out of rubbish. The card can't be very far from where the other pieces were. I go back in. Himmat, guts, Fear Factor. A few Indians are walking by. Strange look in their eyes. I have no time for them. I have important things to do -- rummage through rubbish, for instance. The card is deeply ensconsed in the thick layer of wet dirt covering the floor . I pull it out -- it's damp and discolored. Probably won't work. All this for nothing.
Moments later, I'm in the bathroom of a nearby desi chat place, carefully assembling the pieces. Surprisingly, it does work. Actually, as I'm typing this, the phone is displaying an "insert SIM card" message - probably as a result of the dirt finally making its way to the innards of the circuit board. A reboot seems to help.) Ah, the face that graces my phone's display (Aishwarya) is back on, in its full glory.
Anyway, why am I writing this? I might be fussy about many matters but this is probably the closest I'll ever find myself in rubbish and I can't help but wonder that there are scavengers who do this daily. I'm not talking about birds or insects. These are human kids, in the prime of their childhood running through heaps of garbage to find those precious trinkets that can fetch them a few rupees to buy the next meal. We live a highly sanitized life here, no doubt. I am not saying that we should feel guilty about it but there is a whole world out there that lives on literally nothing, yet, it survives and prospers.
posted by yash | 2:25 PM
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