Finish a good breakfast - ond upittu, ond coffee (strongu). Hurriedly, start for the bus stop.
Spot a newspaper stall amidst the morning rush.
Be reminded of the talk you have had with your father every other night of the last several weeks, and of your employment status - 'Recent Graduate (May 2009) actively seeking an Entry Level Position'.
The profile of a graduate unemployed for over eighteen months after finishing school is not recent enough for most companies to consider it suitable for an 'Entry Level' position. Nor does it qualify for a 'Senior' position for the lack of experience such a position demands.
May 2009 was over twelve months ago.
'Seeking an Entry Level Position' has been the status of your self since.
'Worried about him' has been the status of your father since.
Deliberate his suggestion one more time. Unlike you, he did not have the internet to search for vacancies when he was a 'Recent Graduate (May 1980) actively looking for an Entry Level Position'. With great reluctance, walk to the stall.
Ask for Employment News. It's your first time buying it. Curiously scan the items he has on display but fail to spot it. Watch him attend to others before he acknowledges your enquiry and disappears into the main shop behind the stall. A few moments later, watch him emerge with a thick bundle of papers, folded in his hands.
Ask him the price.
9 Rupees.
It is a weekly issue - priced almost twice as much as you expect a daily to be. Trade for it a ten-rupee note. Hold it outstretched, to take a look at the front page while waiting for him to return the change.
Gasp! before you are paralysed.
The blow, immense in power, is dealt at the centre of your guts.
A moment later, gather your shattered senses.
Close your eyes as you shake your head and scream out to the world -
Why. . .?
Why is it PINK?
The front page. . .
Why?
Just . . . why?
Only, no one hears you.
May be it is soft on the soul - the colour. Soothing, perhaps.
May be it is the government's way of pacifying its unemployed citizens - telling them not to worry. That it will be all right. That they will all find a job soon. That it will all be okay. Soon.
Pretty pink soon?
May be. Just. . . may be.
