Natasha, aka Nats, my 19-year-old Gen Z neighbour stormed into my home. She was on fire, she was fuming, she was furious, but amidst all the flames and brimstone, there were tears — tears that seemed to stem out of helplessness and hopelessness.
“Sup Nats, hello, do I dare ask what’s up, how are you, where have you been, on a sabbatical? On a spiritual journey? Are you sad,” I asked, guardedly.
Nats wiped away a tear, gathered herself then began a rant.
“Rahul dude… No bruh, no sabbatical, no spiritual journey, I’m sad for sure, but not in a booohoohoo kind of way, but in a cry the beloved country kind of way. I’ve been hiding away, trying to meditate, calm myself down… but to no avail dude, to no avail, no avail, the anger is building. Building so much that I fear it may erupt like a landslide off the Aravalli Hills,” she exploded.
“Natasha…,” I began.
“I’m feeling many emotions all at once, but none of them positive. We’re at the end of another year, we should be feeling love and joy and gratitude and good tidings, but I’m at another level of rage-bait. You know rage-bait, yes, it’s the Oxford Dictionary word of the year. Yeah, it’s that week, when those ‘groups’, they’re disrupting cribs, and churches and choirs and Clauses and Christmas, and beating up poor vendors selling Christmasy stuff, what’s the story… how can chants replace carols?
Rahul unc, you wanna know what ails me, what angers me, what makes me go crazy with helplessness? We live in a time of serious hate, hate hate hate. Tell me Rahul bruh, when you were my age, if it is possible dude, you can remember, when you were 19, did you feel around you such toxicity, such a tendency to destroy and hurt, and tear apart and torment, such callousness and carelessness? A minister who should be concerned about the AQI levels in the capital, attacks an African coach, who’s been teaching kids to play football, for not knowing Hindi! Dude, at every level, that’s just bullying, it’s cruel. That a railway line is built across a sanctuary in Assam, and eight elephants are just run over? Is that carelessness at another level?
The anger dude, the pent-up frustration, that resides in us, was it always there and now, it’s open licence to go out and express? And tell me, bruh… do you recall a minor argument, debate, escalating to a point where the two parties come to blows, resulting in death? When did we welcome into ourselves such a feeling of lawlessness, of anarchy of, ‘we can do anything — drive drunk, mow down people, run over pavement dwellers, knock down joggers, drag them on the under side of your car — how can groups lynch a man to death, and fear no consequences? And repeatedly, relentlessly, dude Rahul, rape continues unabated, rapists continue to be released and the survivors humiliated. Bruh, domestic violence, deepfakes, digital age cyber crimes — danger at every turn.
Unnecessary loss of lives, the sheer de-valuation, devolution, degradation dude, violence, vitriol, venom, voyeurism, vandalism — Bruh… what kind of world are you leaving to us, Trump and terrorism, and geo-political skirmishes, don’t get me started. Gotta bounce, Happy New Year, dude.”
And Natasha aka Nats, left my premises.
Rahul daCunha is an adman, theatre director/playwright, filmmaker and traveller. Reach him at rahul.dacunha@mid-day.com