THE FACE I COULD NOT IGNORE

I had gone down to Dimapur for a day and as usual I drove my mother around the town for her normal grocery shopping. That is how we landed up at the New Market area which is a crowded bazaar with water logged roads, filthy drains, rickety shops lined with hawkers on both sides of the path and teeming with shoppers, auto rickshaws, carts, ice cream vendors, labourers, flea stores and a mass of vehicles parked as they liked. And it also includes few helpful elderly policemen going about doing their regular task.
The traffic rules in Dimapur keep changing so often that I usually end up getting confused about the ‘one way’ routes as, more often than not, the signboards indicating the signals are not there or kept at the far end of the lane almost negligible to the eye. This so, I entered the market area from the wrong side causing quite a nuisance to few drivers until two kind policemen went out of their way to find a suitable, if not the best, parking place for our car. And that was to be my dwelling for the next one hour while my mom went from one shop to another.
Although the heat in Dimapur is not much compared to other places outside Nagaland, it’s the humidity that exasperate me no end. It’s agonizingly uncomfortable and usually sets me in an irritable mood. I sat behind the wheel in the cool confines of the car for almost an hour (albeit grumbles and a feeling of annoyance) and caught glimpses of the people, the chaos and the high liveliness that the dingy place seemed to give off. There are times when I like getting lost in the crowd and yet observe the little niceties here and there that can touch our lives in a subtle yet significant way. And this day was no different…
As I sat there observing the environs, from my opposite direction an old man wearing a sweaty tattered and discoloured shirt and a ‘lungi’, or ‘wrap - around’ in common language, staggered with a loaded ‘thela’/ cart on the middle of the pathway. He would most probably be in his fifties although poverty made him look much older. Numerous wrinkles lined his weary forehead and gaunt sunken cheeks. He walked unsteadily with his heavy load and the wheels (it looked like bicycle wheels to me) were uneven and seemed as if it would pop out of the wobbly cart. It was noon and the sun was at its fiercest. The old man was perspiring profusely but he could not even wipe off the grime from his face although I noticed that he had an equally tattered and sweaty scarf around his neck.
Just then the old man and the cart came face to face with a Scorpio vehicle, with a VIP lady and few VIP kids. The old man could not move back due to the heavy load and the vehicle remained just in front of the cart puller although it could have backed out a little to let him swerve to the side. Nervousness and apprehension gripped the old man most likely because he might have thought that he would be reprimanded for blocking the way of such an important looking vehicle.
Amidst the tension, from nowhere another similar looking frail chap appeared and shoved the cart back and forth with great exertion. Time and again the sweaty old man glanced apologetically towards the Scorpio driver while trying very hard to pull the cart away from the path. It took a great deal of attempt until it could be veered off from the main road. The Scorpio sped away nonchalantly and then the old man gave off the most fulfilling smile I’ve ever come across in a long time. Heaving a sigh of relieve he put the cart down, wiped his brow with his sweaty scarf and thanked the other person for helping him out of what seemed like a deadlock situation to him. He then started off again with the persisting smile, crossed our car and vanished into the narrow lanes...