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Ramanujam Sridhar

IT WAS 5-45 a.m. in Durban. My body and (if one may add soul) were at home. We were staying in a wonderful waterfront hotel.

And although I am no Shane Warne, the beach appeals to me. But being the cautious South Indian that I am, I started my market research. Is it safe to walk in the beach? "Of course sir," said the maitre, "it is almost 6 0'clock".

I started to walk briskly (though my detractors would say stroll) in front of the hotel itself. I went up to the doorman of the adjoining hotel to get a second opinion. "You are wearing a watch and a chain. I wouldn't advise you to walk on the beach".

Suitably reassured I stayed walking, one anxious eye on the pavement and the other on the drizzly sky as it was match day. Soon my brief walk was interrupted by a loud cry of "thief" and "stop him".

An ungainly youth of 16 (as I discovered later) was running with a lady's handbag that he had obviously snatched. A man was chasing him on a cycle, pedalling furiously.

Hotel staff joined in readily. Quickly the boy was caught and overwhelmed. He was hit on the face, pummelled on chest and knocked down. "Kill the rat," said my hotel maitre who was obviously embarrassed. "Hit him with a baseball club". "Call the cops".

Amidst all this, an old lady came running to say, "Leave the poor boy ". Her pleading and the poor boy's cries were ignored.

And soon enough the cops landed. I was impressed by the unity of all the people who joined in the hunt. I was not so impressed at the way the poor boy was mauled.

Yes, we all know what happens when a pickpocket is caught in Dadar on a suburban train, or when a petty thief is picked up in a tram in Kolkata. Yes, the more one travels, the more one sees people are the same. And the cause is all the poverty that we so brazenly ignore.

Poverty that hits you as much in Durban, right in front of the fancy hotels that tourists patronise. Yes, South Africans want their country to be crime-free.

And yet the reality is people sleep on pavements in tents and sell their wares on the same pavement the following day. Both the countries that Gandhiji served are still struggling.

I remember part of the words of a cheeky slogan on a T-shirt in New York, "Don't walk in the park". "Don't talk to strangers". "Don't ask for directions". And after a few more such don'ts was the line, "Enjoy your stay in New York".

I do hope I enjoy my stay in South Africa, although it was dampened by the doorman of the adjoining hotel sidling up to me and saying, "See I told you so".

But more than anything else was my disappointment with myself for having spent thousands of rupees to travel across the continents to watch a cricket match whilst people all around me are starving.

(Feedback can be mailed to Sridhar@brand-comm.com)

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