Estimated reading time: 4 minutes.
On a cloudy day, Aakash was sitting in balcony of his flat. It was a lazy Sunday morning. He got up a bit later than he usually did. He made his cup of black coffee, pulled an armchair in the balcony and sat slowly. He once loved the clouds and the prospect of rains it brought. Nowadays though, he feels all gloomy. He had started to believe that those blackish gray clouds bring sullenness in mood.
He just stayed seated there for quite some time. His wife, and kid were still asleep. It was Sunday, after all. Sipping on his cup of piping hot coffee, he mulled over the recent thoughts he had about quitting his job. He was in his early thirties and his hairs had started to grow gray. Despite much of his efforts he wasn’t going anywhere in his career. He had come to a realisation that his value was not really evaluated, his potential never really tested and was never in a position to clench a life changing opportunities in any of the companies he had ever worked.
His smartphone buzzed. There was a notification for him What’sApp. He picked up his phone and checked what it was. It was a small video clip. What it conveyed to him, made more sense than its dark humour. His situation wasn’t much different than the monkey’s in the video clip. A captured monkey was somersaulting to the whims of a madari, the monkey catcher. The more the crowd cheered, the more the monkey had to exhaust itself dancing to the tunes of the madari, else it feared either bashing or fasting at the end of the day, if the madari did not end his day earning sufficiently.
It is quite easy to catch a clueless and inquisitive monkey. A monkey catcher sets a small cage and puts a few peanuts into it and hides behind bushes. Sometimes even if a monkey sees that the trap is set, an innately curious animal like it, still reaches the trap. Seeing peanuts, it puts its hands in the cage and grabs as many peanuts as it can. When it pulls his hands, he can’t get rid of the cage. The monkey doesn’t want to release a fistful of peanuts he holds. It cries for its freedom. It had his freedom before when he did not seek peanuts in cage. It was free to pick and satiate itself from whatever fruits trees bore. It is its greed that traps him. The monkey doesn’t realize that once it gets rid of his possession, it re-gains its freedom. Rather it is its mental block that makes it the captive of the situation. Now as the monkey catcher emerges out of his hiding from the bushes, the monkey strives harder and harder and yet, it doesn’t let go of peanuts. Finally, the fate of monkey lies in will of the monkey catcher. The monkey catcher makes it dance, somersault or whatever monkey business he deems necessary to keep audience entertained and earn him earnings.
Didn’t Aakash had to do the same monkey business to keep his house running? Despite him being over-qualified, he had to do menial tasks at office for meager payments. He was doing it every month, months after months and he had became the slave he never intended to be.
Aakash came out of his trance as his three year old giggled while closing his eyes with her tiny hands. With her every chuckle, the range of his lips widened till he himself started laughing. It was her and his wife; he cared for more than himself. He pulled his dear sweet little thing, his daughter Sara closer to himself and reminded himself that despite all the hardships he had to endure in his professional life, it was her smile that made him get out of his sulky mood, every day.
His smartphone buzzed again. A calendar reminder popped on the screen. He had to prepare a high visibility presentation. It was his senior who would just read through it to the management board without knowing the nitty-gritty of the subject. No brownie points for Aakash! His senior would hog onto the credits and Aakash would be side-lined again.
Yet, Aakash got onto his laptop started typing slides after slides, keeping aside his holiday, family and his own happiness.