Just a cup of tea.............

Today had been unusually busy. Most of the day had been spent in winding up and closing the packing. We were travelling back to India the early morning next day. And I didn’t want to leave anything unfinished until the last minute.

I was so engrossed in the packing, that I had missed my usual tea time. Once done with the packing I soon realized that my head had slowly to throb with pain. I ran to the kitchen counter to make myself a cup of tea. It was then I realized that I had run out of the tea and dairy creamers.

I just sat down suddenly lonely. Tears just flowed down my eyes. All I wanted was a cup of tea. A single cup of tea. It must have been perplexing to my daughter, mom on the bed, silent, with tears running down her cheek.

She just stood there just not knowing what to do. I mean what was a five year old supposed to do. Moms are not supposed to sit at a place and cry. They are supposed to be much stronger. After a few seconds of glassy silence, she opened her mouth. What happened?

I need a cup of tea.

Tea she said, just that, why do you have to cry for that now. Can’t we just get it from somewhere? There are no small restaurants around.

Remember that neighboring aunty you used to talk to. We can just go there

I don’t know her much. How can we just walk in to some stranger’s house for a cup of tea?

Then we go to moushis place. You definitely know her. Ok but we have to walk quite a bit for that. But it is at least better than sitting and crying here.

Ok let me just call her number. To my bad luck nobody picked up the phone at her place. Now mama stop being a cry baby. Come let’s get to that small department store and get some tea bags. When my kid displays better intelligence than me, it puts me to shame sometime.

So at 4 clock in the evening, with sun god still not in the relenting mood, me and my daughter decided to go to the department store. ( no I didn’t have the patience to wait for the home delivery. I wanted the tea packets now)

I got my 5 year old daughter and started walking briskly towards the store, cursing myself all along for being so clumsy in the planning of the daily requirements. Of course this was bound to happen. I mean we were winding. I quickly grabbed the things I wanted and went to the queue for the billing counter. Being a weekend the queue was longer than usual today.

Standing at the billing counter of the small convenience store and waiting for my turn I tried to control the throbbing pain in my head. It was way past my evening tea time. Having my cup of tea around 4 in the evening was a regular must every day.

As I looked around, ahead of me I saw a frail looking lady. Holding her cleaning overalls in one hand and the grocery basket in another she had her both hands full. She looked like a cleaning lady. And she probably had finished her daily job and was buying things on her way back home. A quick glance at the basket revealed few daily requirement things one would require, tea bread and salad box. She saw me glancing at her basket. I felt a slight discomfort at being caught. I looked at my basket and contents were more or less similar

But fortunately she smiled back.

Now I was forced to smile. I slowly muttered under my breadth –long queues

Yeah she agreed, weekend queues were bad. The queues were not so bad during the week days. But during weekends they were unbearable. Apparently she couldn’t avoid coming to the store during the weekend. She worked on contract basis. And she only got paid if she was hired for some job.

But she didn’t mind at all. She was happy here. She usually got a few odd jobs. And the money was good when she had. And the food was definitely good. She kept talking and I kept nodding my head.

I could definitely see that she was happy by the way she talked.

My head was still throbbing with pain. All I wanted to do was rush back, make my tea and drink it. Damn with her if she was happy or not.

And then she asked in her broken English –you here for long????

A sudden jolt of an uneasy feeling ran through me. A whole gamut of emotions suddenly arose in a matter of split second. This depressing thought that within a span of three months I now had to relocate once again increased my headache. I had literally become modern gypsy. I was living by the day. I hadn’t come to this city for a tourist visit. I had come here to stay. Just three months back I had uprooted myself from a familiar place to follow my dreams to begin my life in a new country. Now once again after three months I was packing again. It had become a nomad’s life. Earn for today and spend for today. Much like the lady ahead. Things like long term settlements didn’t currently exist in my dictionary.

But then what the hell, if that that lady had enough reasons to be happy. So can I. I was forced to leave this place. But to where? Back to my country again.

My turn to pay had come. Quickly I paid for my things and looked at the basket. That innocuous looking tea packet was sitting all smug and cozy, ready to take the plunge in the water. It certainly didn’t care. Whether the lady ahead of me had a chance or no, whether she even wanted a settled life or no, a part of me now felt happy that we were going back to our country now. May be the new city would offer us a better experience than the current one .This city had made sure that we had our firsthand experience of the global economic recession the world was going though. Made us aware some of the tough realities of life. May be what we went through in the last three months would soon be forgotten. And that was my country.

In that city, at least I would get a cup of tea when I wanted one. I would be among familiar people.