The less we have, the more we share ...(?)

Sitting in Cubbon park that morning, i just could not believe that such a calm, quite, colorful, beautiful place still existed in Bangalore. And that too in the heart of the city. Agreed, the park (like all other other parks) is not maintained well. But i still think any Bangalorean who visits the place (especially early in the morning) will be very glad to know such a place does exist in this chaotic city.

I had reached there very early, would now have to spend at least an hour before the entire skit team arrived and we started work on the new skit.

I found a spot - a stone bench, a little away from the main pathway, spread out the newspaper i had picked before entering the park, reminded myself that i was very much in Bangalore, and started reading.

As i sat enjoying the silence, i saw a couple of rag pickers, moving around a little away from me. They were literally in rags, their dress (in no way close to one) barely covering their body, with unkempt hair, looked as dirty as one could imagine. They were carrying couple of big plastic bags, full of "something". As i watched them, i noticed they were being followed by a big group of street dogs. At least ten of them. It is not very uncommon to see rag pickers being followed/chased by street dogs. After all, they both have to fight it out, to claim their share of food from the dirty bins.

Nowadays, i don't think i am bothered much by such things, have got used to the city. I went back to reading my paper. As i flipped the newspaper over to the sports page, i looked up momentarily. What i saw amazed me, i put the paper down and started watching the rag pickers and the dogs.

The two rag pickers had found a spot on a huge boulder. One of the guys climbed on top of it, pulled out some old newspapers, tore them uniformly into a number of pieces and placed them one beside the other even as the other guy below tried to keep the dogs away. I noticed he was not chasing them away, he was just trying to keep them at a distance. The guy on top pulled out from the two covers, "food", probably stale, probably accumulated over a period of time. He then spread out the food on all the pieces of paper. What happened next i had never expected.

The two guys now got down and started isolating one dog from the entire group at a time. They then fed it with one part of the food they had spread out. The two rag pickers, like this, ensured that each of the  the ten dogs got its share. For the dogs that were looking a little weak, they stood guard until it finished eating. This went on for the next twenty minutes. Once they had fed all the dogs, they got on top of the boulder, themselves ate, packed the remaining food in their bags and left the place.

The two rag pickers probably owned nothing in this world. They probably had no place to stay, wore only torn clothes, and probably did not even know when, how, or where (if at all) they would eat next. Yet...