The Earthquake

It was a fine winter's morning in the city of Ahmedabad. As much as I disliked the city, one thing good about this city was its winters. In Mumbai where I used to live, winter was only namesake. The lowest temperature was as 'low' as 35 degree Celsius! But Ahmedabad was different, it did have very harsh summers and winters but the winters were good. It was almost the end of winter, and India was waking up to its 54th Republic Day after independence from the British. A lazy Sunday morning, people were a trite disappointed that they lost the holiday to Sunday.
I was working in Ahmedabad at the time. I used to stay as a paying guest with a family of three, a young couple with a four-year-old son. Republic Day in India is celebrated with much fanfare. The capital Delhi witnesses a Republic Day Parade, where different states perform and the defense forces display their stunts and units. This is telecast live on TV across all homes in the country.
"What will you do watching the parade with your landlords, why don't you come over and spend the Sunday with me, I will be leaving in the evening for Chennai and you can help me pack?" asked my friend and colleague.
"OK" I accepted the invitation immediately, as I was truly wondering how to spend the Sunday otherwise, because all others had made their plans, either they were at their hometowns, or had other plans.
So I said, "ok, I will be there".
"Fine, you can have breakfast with me, I will prepare some nice stuff".
I was thrilled at the offer, I was tired of the food that I was eating everyday and longed to eat something tasty, and my friend was a very good cook.
So Sunday arrived and I got up early, quite surprisingly, when I have to go to work, I hate to get up and when I don't have to work I wasn't sleepy.
As I lay on the bed I thought, let me go a bit early to my friends place and help her prepare breakfast instead of landing there for breakfast directly. So I got up, had a bath, dressed up and opened my room door. The entire household was in deep slumber. Their Sundays never began before 11am. So as I tiptoed into the hallway, I knocked at their bedroom door so I could tell my landlady that I was leaving, and she could lock the door from inside.
She groggily opened the door, "Err I am sorry to disturb you, but I am going to my friends place and will be back only at night, so if you can please lock the main door from inside…"
"Oh, its ok, I am almost up, we are also planning to go out, have to get up and get ready, what you can do is latch the door from outside, the maid will be coming in half an hours time, she will open it and come inside, I can sleep till then. You latch it from outside and go, ok?"
I wasn't too thrilled with the idea, if she has already come up to open this door, why can't she just lock it from the inside?
"Err… Ok" I agreed reluctantly.
I got out of the house, came to the basement where I had parked my moped, started it and left for my friend's house. The streets were almost empty, being a Sunday. When normally it took me 20 minutes to reach, I reached in 10 minutes. As I reached, breakfast was ready and piping hot, it had just been taken off the gas. Anita placed it on the table and went in to get the plates, when suddenly I felt the table shaking. I thought it was probably because I was the rocking the chair that I was sitting on and stopped only to find the table rattles even more. I immediately got up and realized the ground beneath me was shaking, " Anita aaa!" I yelled,
" What's happening?" she replied as she came to the hall holding the wall, as she couldn't walk straight. "Crash!!!!" the vessel with the hot sambar had slide off the table with all that shaking, suddenly, we heard screams from the neighbor's house. "It's an earthquake, run!!!" Anita and I held whatever we could find and managed to come out of her house, when the beam at her doorway collapsed, right behind us! "Phew that was close". All people had come out of their homes and were screaming and all around I could hear cries and shouts of people. This was the first time that they were experiencing an earthquake. Many couldn't understand what was happening in the first place and what to do?
And all of a sudden everything calmed down; it was as though we just got off a bad train ride. As all were gathering themselves, and trying to come to terms with this terror, a thought struck me like lightening! "Oh my gawd, Ants I need to go, I have to go right now".
"Are you crazy why do you want to go home now what's the hurry?"
"I have to go before its too late Ants". I replied as I drove away, 'will let you know later bye…"
My mind was filled with dreadful thoughts, what if they tried to get out and couldn't, got trapped, what if the building has collapsed and they have died? Its all my fault I should never have agreed to latch the door from outside. My mind was so full of what could have happened to my landlord's family, that I didn't realize there was a second tremor. I lost control and suddenly I was thrown off the moped, I fell hard on a pile of mud, I sprained my left arm real bad. As I tried to get up, I couldn't as I had nothing to hold on to and my feet were shaking with the ground beneath it. A few feet away, I saw small shops just disappearing, only then I realized that the ground had cracked and was eating everything on the way, like a monster, I shuddered at the thought, it was like the monster was coming towards me, I wanted to run, I didn't know what to do, I said my last prayers, looked up at the sky, asking why I had been chosen to have such a painful death, Cows were mooing and, dogs were barking, birds were screeching, a car opposite me took an immediate u-turn, thanks to the shaky ground. All thoughts of my landlords vanished, I was thinking how can I save myself, I caught hold of my moped, which was fallen, I held the handle and stood up, shaking, and all of a sudden the tremors stopped, suddenly people emerged out of nowhere, and were running helter skelter. I was thrilled, for the moment, I said a quick prayer, I was desperate to get home; first the one in Ahmedabad and home in Mumbai. I wanted my mom, dad, sister, brother, friends, "God please don't let, me die here without seeing them please". I started the moped but it refused to start, what do I do now? There is no other way but to walk. I just wanted to reach home and ensure that they were let out of the house. I scrambled to my feet, but I just couldn't stand, I was dead sure that my folks would be dead by now. Cries and moans filled the air, so I parked my moped, carefully and with much love and affection, not expecting to see it there, when I returned, or rather IF I returned. And like many others, I started running towards my home, I ran and ran on what seemed like a never ending road, and I saw people crying and wailing, children hugging their parents, and mostly people sitting by the side of the road in a daze, wondering what struck them?
By the time I reached home, not expecting to find my building where it was, I saw from a distance, there it was standing, perfectly, not a scratch, unscathed, and untouched. I rushed into the building compound, all occupants of the building were down, but three, I pushed through the crowd, people screamed "'Ai where are you going, come back, something may fall on your head, come back",
Well whatever falls, cannot be worse than the burden of being responsible for the death of 3 innocent lives, I thought.
I reached the 2nd floor panting and dashed towards my apartment, only to find the door ajar!
I ran towards the house, and stopped at the door to find the entire house in shambles, the cupboard had fallen down, the TV was shattered into pieces, the broken transistor, was playing the live commentary of the Republic Day parade in the background.
I could hear 'Saurabh' the 4-year-old son crying in the room inside. I jumped aver the rubble and rushed inside to find all three sitting on the couch like as though nothing had happened!!!
" Whaa? Why are you here, why aren't you down, why are you sitting at home?"
" Oh ho Jyoti why you so worried, if its in our destiny to die in an earthquake, we will die even if we escape from here, so its no use running" Said the landlord.
"What are you crazy?"
"Just see Jyoti, I don't know whether to take my son and run or sit with my husband here?"
Suddenly this good wife syndrome had dawned upon my landlady and she was in a fix, I could really understand her position.
"That's very true" I reasoned with the landlord, "but at least think of your wife and child, maybe you are destined but they are not, so any case you are going to die, go outside and die so they can live!!!" I was so mixed with feelings of relief and anger at this mans foolishness that I didn't even realize what I was saying, I just wanted to drag him by the collar and shove him out of the building. Somehow I convinced him and the four of us went downstairs, while I thanked GOD for saving me from living a life of guilt, for saving my life from near death, but wondering what had invoked his wrath for so much loss of life and property?
The story of my experience ends here, though I am sure many more who were seriously affected by the earthquake would have harrowing experiences to relate.