Appooppanthaadi -58



An evening by the sea shore - down loaded from the net

Only heartless persons can ban cameras on Das Island. How beautiful the sky was in the evening today! It was well past the sun set but the horizon was still live with the marvelous hues the sun has springled from its last remaining life. The black and white clouds on the western part have aligned themselves to entertain like in a still photograph of a colourful and well coreographed dance concert.

Small and big grids of black and white clouds in the back drop of the blue sky got a bright shade of red in the dying moments of the evening. To put in another way, It was as if a great painter patiently sat and produced a marvelous piece of beauty for everyone on the earth to relish. Of course, it needs a heart to enjoy this. Sadly someone who never liked to enjoy the magnificence of such a spectacle had banned cameras on Das Island.

 I am not a poet to articulate those scenes in all its splendor and grandeur. If I had a camera, I would have clicked a few shots and shared them with you all. All my colleagues were also heard ruing the missing opportunity. There is no justification for not allowing camera here. I wonder what the babus want to hide when everything is out in the open on the internet including the google maps https://maps.google.ae/maps?hl=en&tab=wl

Yesterday, Das Island was greated with the death of a worker. A sardarji, after completing his first half's work returned on his bicycle to his room for the lunch break. As he was entering the room, collapsed at the door step itself and died on the spot. That was the end of a  human being who dreamt of a decent life back home. What if he leads a miserable life in an open jail like Das Island? What mattered him, like the thousands live here, was the fatter bank balances at the end of every month. But dashing all hopes and big future plans,within a span of a few moments a human being was turned into a dead body. Everyone who came to know of this incident was shocked. Everyone, accompanied by a long sigh, uttered the same words - that is life. I even recited a couplet in my mind from the famous devotional poem Njanappana that always reminds us of the hollowness of life. It is a water bubble and it may burst anytime without a warning. Alone we come, alone we go...in the short stay we get here, we meet so many people and events. One day, like this sardarji, we disappear leaving even the clothes we wear...in all manifestations, that is the essense of life.

We visted the hosptal in the afternoon. The body was by that time bundled up and moved over to the mortury, waiting for the helicopter to turn up. The helicopter takes the body to Abu Dhabi. After the visit,  all of us went to the ATM counter, withdrew some money and then walked around the park in Das Island - there are a few deers, peacocks and hens roaming around in this park. That is life, on the other hand! The rosy picture for the unaffected ones - the ones who always think that they are immortal and all bad things happen only to others...

It is not easy to be in Gulf. It is worst to be working in African Countries. The well dressed, 'divine figure in the locality' is far removed from all those pomp and pageantry, that he shows off in his village, when he reaches back for work here. Panalties for trafic violations, scorching sun everywhere (most of our people work at a temperature as high as 50 degrees) and primitive punishment methods for even minor offences await him here. 12 hours of a day is dedicated to work. A large majority of the work force in search of a good life is in the field of construction and they are out in the merciless sun in their major part of life.

In the very night of the day the sardarji died, there was a big procession of a number of cars on the roads of Das Island. The locals were celebrating the victory of UAE in the GCC cup football championship. They were honking and even driving vehicles that were used for emergency purposes. The emergency vehicles were making sirens. It was around 1045 in the night then. I was a little frightened at seeing the vehicles and the noise they were making at the backdrop of the attack on one oil processing facilities in Algeria.

 http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/algeria-siege-toll-rises-to-81/article4328780.ece

The Algerial gas plant - Look alike of Syria plant

The revellers went around the roads and then dispersed. But the Algerian oil facility is not yet cooled down. When I saw the pictures of that set up somewhere deep in the Sahara desert, I remembered the similar plant I saw in Syria. A few of the people whom I came across have gone to Algeria after the Syrian assignment. I only wish all of them are safe and secure wherever they are.

The sardarji's body has been airlifted in a helicopter from here to Abu Dhabi. From there it will be transported to India in a few days. It may take four to five days to process the formalities before it is flown to its destination. Fortunately in UAE, it takes only less than a weeks for the process to complete, but had it been in some other countries, it could take at least 2 months to take a dead body home, especially if it is an unnatural death. Imagine the near and dear of the deceased spending months together to do his/her last rites.

The Arabian Desert

Against all odds, that is how life in a construction site in Gulf can be summarised. Not only braving the punishing sun, one has to fight humidity too. Months or years together these work force do not see their near ones. Even if there is a rule that everyone working on Das Island must be allowed to take a break after every five or six months, most of the contractors do not allow their workers to enjoy this advantage.


 The workers at the lower strata suffer the most. They get the minimal facilities here, with four people squeezed into one porta cabin and common toilets and bathrooms outside. The only advantage they get is the strict safety rules at work place. They get shelters to take rest and drinking water near to their work place. This is not volantarily arranged by the contractor but due to constant threats and arm twisting by the saftey officers of the client. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabian_Desert

So, let us pardon him if he shows a little theatrics back home when he comes for a short break. Let him walk around with a foreign cigarette in his hand, fragrance spreading body and accompanied by a cohort of admirers. This is how he tries to find solace from the monotonous, gruelling and nostalgic life he leads for the major part of his existance here. Next time if you see me with a golden watch on my wrist, a thick gold chain around my neck, a smart phone in hand and telling everyone whom I come across " In Dubai, things are not like this..." please do not laugh in your mind. We ought to be like this...