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- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Survival / Success
- Subject: Culture / Heritage / Lifestyles
- Published: 09/08/2013
Dire Blessings
Born 1977, F, from KOLKATA, India.jpg)
Dire Blessings
It’s a familiar sight for motorists- cars stopping at traffic signals, vendors hawking anything from flowers and toys to dusters and dhupkathies, descending on them like bees to a hive. In the midst of this melee, there were grubby hands imploring you to part with a rupee. If your heart melted, you relented, and then the going got tough. The children were replaced by women. You would see the same faces day after day wearing the same woebegone look, some of them carrying children in their arms, others looking perpetually in advanced stages of pregnancy month after month.
Gradually the going got tougher. Now you have young men attired in saffron with huge tilaks on their foreheads, carrying a trishul- in some cases a snake- ordering you to give them money for your own good. “You will be cursed by snake god if you don’t,” warns one. “This will be a bad day for you,” threatens another.
You are not going to be intimidated by these grim portents, you tell yourself firmly. Fine!! But that’s not the end of the ordeal. If you happen to be travelling with a member of the opposite sex, heaven help you. From- “May you have a long and happy married life” to “may you be the parents of a 100 sons….”
You will have the choicest blessings showered on you. Never mind if your companion is your boss, your sibling or your own parents, you may not be afraid of the snakes but in the face of this unwarranted “pairing” what do you do? Part with some money and pray hard that you will be left alone, until the next signal, that is ……
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