SABKA TIME AAYEGA -- TWO CONTRASTING STORIES

Life of Monty, courier boy

In the post-pandemic era of e-commerce boom, where everyone is ordering their daily essentials from the safety of their homes, a day in the life of Monty has completely turned on its head. Monty, a courier boy living in a humble one-room apartment shared by 5 other such guys of his age, used to be ‘hardly-working’. Now he is ‘working-hard’ to finish the quota of daily deliveries –he surely has his hands full (both literally & figuratively).

Monty earlier used to have an easy-going life - with 15-20 deliveries in a day, checking on his other friends who were delivering in the same areas to stopping by for a chai at the local tapri shop in between his orders. He used to be always on a look-out for more similar jobs that he could do alongside package-delivery so that he could have more take-home by the end of the month. But with his modest qualification, it wasn’t easy. ‘Apna time aayega!’ – he used to wonder.

But slowly and steadily, with the wild-card entry of corona, things have picked up! Since the new variant seems to be air-borne longer than its parent variant (a la the child being naughtier than his parent), every sensible person wants to remain locked-up in their houses unless they have absolute urgent desire to take a breath of fresh (or contaminated?) air. Remaining inside for a longer time, would mean avoiding lifts, lobbies and common areas where other people could have passed by.

For Monty, however, this opportunity was a double-edged sword. He has a jam-packed schedule now. But, unfortunately not the way he had wanted – has no other option but to double up as a warrior. It’s like getting himself ready for a war on a daily basis – having double masks (like a shield), having temperature-checked at the gates (like ammunition-check in a hands-up mode) and carrying bags which must be double his size and weighing probably heavier than a few guns put together! From tower to tower in the same society using the lifts multiple times to going from one society to the other- he has to be on his toes doing back to back deliveries.

Nevertheless, after slogging for over 12 hours (8 pm is the last delivery of the day) – for some people, Monty is a ‘Saviour’ having received their essential items timely and for some he is like a ‘ticking time bomb’ who seemed to have been in touch with many during the day and hence giving him an ‘un-touchable’ treatment! Was this how he imagined his life to be??

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Life of Sharma ji, local grocery storekeeper

On the other hand, Life has taken a complete U-turn for Sharma ji who owns a kiraana dukaan in one of the residential areas – in the current social-media lingo, it has gone from active to inactive mode!

In earlier days, picking up milk packets / queuing up in front of dairy booths each morning was just an excuse for a few regular customers to sit and chat with Sharma ji and discuss everything under the sun – from politics to municipal issues. Out of all, these early morning greetings are missed majorly by him.

The daily morning-tally with the vendors and constant discussion of ‘hot-selling’ items vs ‘not-selling’ items – with the vendor pushing him to sell more stuff and the accompanied never-ending nagging. And dealing with the marketing guys of new companies who would come to paste their banners at strategic places in the store and asking him to sneak-in their pamphlets to every customer along with their order.

And how can he forget the festival-rush. Here, Sharma ji would ensure that the entire store would get a different make-over (courtesy festival-banners of popular brands and late-night shifts of the staff to put it up in competition with the next-door neighbour Varma ji). These days, let alone the store, the entire market would be bustling with energy with ‘full-parking’ board springing up very often by the parking-wale bhaiya. Then there used to be people breathing down his neck for day and nights together for their everyday supplies and also to get detailed customisation for creating a perfect gift-hamper for their loved ones.

He misses all this and more. He wants to be back in action.

And now, even though, the store has been refurbished with latest ‘no-touch’ pedal sanitizer at the entrance and staff well equipped with masks, daily temperature checks, fully trained in sanitising door handles regularly, Sharma ji and his folks are eagerly waiting to get busy again. They are waiting for more and more people to drop by physically rather than virtually!

Slowly over time, the social-distancing circles outside his store – which were meant for regulating the number of customers inside at a particular time – have now taken shape of conference area of stray dogs and few birds, who are probably also wondering where have all the people gone?

Now, Sharma ji has started wondering ‘apna time waapas kab aayega?’