I AND MY CITY

The City is far older than me and is my provenance. I had never in the past reflected on my relationship with my City but am looking to it now. I ask myself if I like my City. To answer that question let us take a practical example. A man marries a woman who isn’t particularly attractive but has redeeming features of practical life - acceptance of fortitude and tolerance to cope with the vicissitudes of life and you forget to look particularly for her beauty. You accept her. You get used to her. You may find you can’t live without her. It is something similar when I consider my life relating to the major City I live in, I was born in and grew up in.

City, you have given me everything - my dwelling, my green spaces to grow in, centres of education to cultivate my intellect, opportunities to have a romance, facilities for diversion and body building, landscape for aesthetics, places to get well besides for revival after sickness, and of course amenities for my disposal after I leave. City, I belong to you. You in turn belong to me. You provide me everything I need!

City, what do you look for in me? Your answer I expect would be: responsible living, tolerance towards neighbours, obedience to laws, understanding that earth’s resources are limited and have to be conserved. I know you suffer when thousands of us are swept away by calamities such as a by flooding, pandemics etc, because then your existence is also threatened. I in turn get worried when you are lashed by heavy rain, or if an earthquake strikes obliterating remains of the past stored or venerated by us, besides of structures put up by us in the city.

As you – the City -- expanded I needed reliable transport when cars, trucks, trains etc were made available. I would go to work on suburban trains and their punctuality helped in making my life orderly. When there is excess rain my life is affected as, besides other problems, traffic comes to a standstill. My life gets disorderly again when heat waves hit my atmosphere. I try to cope using fans and air conditioners. When the cold season comes we suffer because of fog and snow. Above all when a pandemic strikes we get decimated till we are able to create suitable vaccines to prevent fatalities. City, when that happens, large parts of you are isolated or abandoned and our lifestyle changes. Take for instance work from home. This has caused many of us to abandon you, the City, and move to faraway places connected only by an electronic umbilicus. Many of us move to other cities, and some of us even work for the USA for example, from India. This kind of evacuation renders city properties empty. Urban population declines. Your prosperity is affected. My working hours on official duty have virtually changed: I am home all the time 5 days of the week! I used to shop during weekends, but have abandoned it as my necessities are delivered at home, including cooked food. Belonging to the old order, I cannot escape the feeling that I am undergoing a sort of simple imprisonment!

The City has changed like my wife has changed with the years. She has grown older and is perhaps more withdrawn. I still love her. I realise I have also changed having grown older. I who was always fond of going round the city in a carefree manner am now conscious of disease and stay home to protect myself. I who was going round in fuel driven vehicles have started using those which are electrically driven. I who wasted water have become conscious of its scarcity and have taken measures to conserve it. My children don’t go to school but stay home being taught the lessons on-line. Even my neighbourhood barber shop has closed as it had only a few customers: Due to prolonged lockdown when such shops were closed, people had  learnt to barber themselves, indifferent to style! Law courts are hearing cases on CCTV with lawyers arguing from home. These are pock marks on the face of you, the City, stricken by the pandemic and will remain.

A revolution has overtaken you - the City – besides us, caused by the pandemic. We are learning to adapt. We are wary about crowds. Wary of sitting in closed environments like cinema halls. Social life of old has come to a halt. We are wary of sitting in closed spaces like cinema halls. Social life of old has almost vanished. We don’t gather at functions or even funerals or even at places of worship: We have learnt of how a large religious gathering spread the pandemic among a large number of people, many of them foreign nationals who spread the disease overseas.

You - the City - have changed as we the citizens have. We have become more concerned with ourselves and more responsible. A new generation is coming up in the changed environment. They don’t attend educational institutions but get the knowledge transferred on-line. We find virtual meetings, virtual conferences going on through electronic devices. This is not a transient change. It is more or less permanent. This will be apparent as the pandemic ends when the survivors will face a totally new environment.

The average citizen of India likes to throng cinema halls, gather at market places, crowd around religious shrines particularly during festive occasions. Large numbers would assemble near river banks or the sea shore on specific days. They would travel to tourist spots or hallowed grounds, but they will no longer do so as they have become wary of disease. The natural impulse of the citizen has changed to caution. Spontaneity has been killed. The city has also aged as it were! There is no love hate relationship with my City. I love my City as much as ever. Once the regular systems have changed, we are unlikely to return to old carefree ways. We have virtually changed the City as it were.

I ask City “Can I Trust You and remain your Citizen?” Of course the answer would be “You certainly can, as long as you treat me as well as I treat you.”

END