Our Disgusting Habits

Have you ever landed at Mumbai airport in the morning? If yes, then during the drive out of the airport to the city, you must have been greeted by the ugly sight of early morning squatters doing their most private business out in the open. Why just Mumbai, ever taken an overnight train? I remember taking a train from Delhi to Jammu in the early morning hours. As soon as the sun rose, you are beseiged with the ugly sight of bottoms bared to the world. Some cared two hoots about doing the full monty, as they took vantage frontal positions, comfortably squatting perilously close to the train tracks. They little realise that as they empty their bowels, they run the risk of disembowelment. This scene is routinely repeated ad nauseum daily all over the country.

The dung heap of our disgusting habits keeps on accumulating. Our beloved countrymen never tire of devising newer and innovative ways to disgust. Spitting is just one of them. Ironically we take so much pride in keeping our houses spic and span. Water shortage or not, our floors must be scrubbed and mopped everyday. Never mind if so much water down the drain will make you mope one day. Why, as soon as  some of our honourable countrymen step outside their homes, the paan spitting contest begin. No wall is safe from the unerring aim of these sharpshooters! The paan spittle comes in a variety of colours. Whatever the colour, the ugly spitting images on the walls even lifts, will hardly lift your spirits rather  will make you see red and spur you on to mayhem. A couple of years back, some civic conscious guys with the backing of the Municipal Corporation, put up hoardings all over Mumbai, advising people to say “Tch, Tch!” whenever they encountered someone spitting. The idea was to make the offender feel bad. I tried to implement this laudable plan as loudly as possible. At the end of the day with all the Tch, tching I did, to various spitfires  I found I needed stitches and had to be grounded!

It’s not just spitting that is disgusting, it’s also our propensity to urinate in public that gets you pissed off. Ours is not such a cold counrty that one needs to urinate so frequently, yet at every street corner and junction you see men zipping down their trousers and letting go in never ending streams. The term watering holes have been redefined by them.Some will not even bother to go to a corner but do it in full view of all and sundry. The aim of the city fathers may be to keep the city clean. The aim of these flashers stinks to the high heavens. In the jungle, animals urinate to mark their territory, in our concrete jungles, the animals who urinate, merely leave marks, without scoring any. In an earlier blog, I had written about the joys and travails of train travel in Mumbai. ( http://edwinfernandes.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/06/the-twain-shall-never-meet.htm) Just yesterday, when  I was returning home, there  was a smart YUPPIE, reading the Eco Times. Quite casually he stuck his right finger into one nostril and started prospecting with obvious pleasure. At the end of it all, he withdrew his goldfinger and held it up as though admiring his handiwork! I almost retched on the wretch. I got up hurriedly, sacrificing my prized window seat and stood by the door because of this boor. Disgusting, you bet.

I must hand it to the Municipal Corporation of Mumbai. They score full marks for perseverance. Recently Clean-up Marshalls have been appointed who have been given smart uniforms. Their job is to scour the city and fine such civic offenders on the spot. Unfortunately such schemes, though well intended, rarely take off. These Marshalls do not have the power to arrest offenders. Hence most of the offenders simply refuse to pay up when caught! Some give these do gooders a piece of their mind with ripostes like, give us more public toliets and we will not commit nuisance in public. Point well taken. Nevertheless, as a race we lack grace. We know how to breed but lack breeding. If a female turns on the charm, well you can be sure she’s inviting harm. So disgusting that while we are groping for answers, women are being groped on the streets.  Truly we as a nation, seem habituated to disgusting habits. God Bless India.

                                                                   A Cleanup Marshall At Chowpathy