village

Back to the village

By Mazhar Khan Jadoon

I was finding it difficult to convince my friend to resume his urban life. "Your city has nothing to offer. It does not help me become a man who is happy with his life. Depression, frustration, never-ending daily chores… This is all your city offers."

"Hold on," I tried to stop him raising both my hands, but could not. He went on "Can you see this smoke of the cigarette reaching out to the sky," he pointed out to a blue streak of smoke ascending from the burning end of the cigarette I was holding. It was a wonderful view from where we were sitting on a hilltop in his village. "Yes, I can see. What's the point?" I asked.

"It is the clean environment and fresh air that you don't find in big cities," he boasted. "Breathe deeply and you will feel the difference," he advised, and I did exactly that. I could feel the cool and fresh air running through every cell of my body. "You will have to go to some big hospital in the city to get such pure oxygen," he taunted.

"Is it not escapism? Are you not trying to run away from your responsibilities," I tried to confront him philosophically. "Yes, I have escaped from the prevalent corruption in urban society, unending loadshedding, crushing pricehike, rude behaviours, injustice, rising crime and deadly blasts. I am tired of living in fear," he retorted angrily.

"Now just hold your breath and stay silent for a while, and try to listen to the sounds around you," he said. I thought he was up to another trick. I could listen to the breeze, chirping birds and some chuckling kids playing at an open place down the hill.

"In the night, all you can hear is silence – pindrop silence – that you need for a sound sleep. You wake up fresh in the morning, with no migraine or stress hangovers. Spend a few nights in this serene village, and your nightmares will turn into pleasant dreams," he advised me.

He went on to talk about the precious moments and relations lost while pursuing vague temptations. "People like you and me keep running all the time trying to maintain the pace for staying in the race. We are like racing horses; looked after and fed till we agree to participate and shot down once we are unable to run."

My friend also had this dream of building a two-kanal house in Defence marking a space for a green lawn, erecting fountains and decorating it with pebbles brought from villages. "After calculating the cost, I realised I won't be able to even purchase land for the house of dream. Then it dawned on me that I could enjoy all these facilities in this village. I have a simple but big house here, surrounded by natural fountains with green fields all around. I need no cages to keep birds as the trees in my lawn house thousands of birds of different hues. My life is in harmony with these birds. They let me know when it is dusk, the time to come home and rest, and they announce the dawn with their own sound that is so soothing. We used to pay our bills for electricity, but now we pay for unending loadshedding. Now I don't have to pay these bills as I get up with birds and go to sleep with birds. Can you keep so many birds in your city house?

My friend still had a lot to say, about organic food and stuff but I got up fearing I might be the next one to sail against the tide – leave a noisy city and settle in a calm village.