On the heaps of sand....
We are what they call the slum dwellers. We live in a four by five home, with a thatched roof that leaks when it showers. My husband works in the sand repository; his main job being to load and unload sand into the huge trucks that carry them.
Today is just another day. I am washing the vessels, after a filling meal, as I watch my husband load sand onto a private truck. They are going to take it out to the city to build tall, skyscraping apartments. My children are playing happily, their voices echoing, trying to catch one another, running and falling on the heaps of sand.
I work as a garbage collector, in the near by apartment, and help people dispose their old stuff. People are strange out here. They buy things that they don’t require, keep them for sometime to show and marvel, and then one fine day decide to throw it all out. But I must admit, I have gotten many a things for my household, by digging into people’s trash. That’s where I found that beautiful mirror of mine; I look so pretty in it.
When I got married, I was very excited about the prospect of moving to the city with my husband, far away from the dreary village where I lived. I had my children here, and since then this place has become my world by and large. The nights are dark generally, we don’t have what they call electricity, but we have a kerosene lamp, which we light when the sand factory owner comes to see us. Sometimes it showers, and we know we won’t have anything to eat for the next few days to come, coz no one buys wet sand. Those days, we sleep empty, little drops falling on our faces through the cracked roof, blending in with our tears, taking it just as another snare that God has cast upon us.
The sun sets and shadows begin to show. The kerosene lamp is lit. The sand factory owner has a frown on his face, as he asks us to vacate. A soaring apartment is going take the place. And we are called to clear the heaps of sand…..
Today is just another day. I am washing the vessels, after a filling meal, as I watch my husband load sand onto a private truck. They are going to take it out to the city to build tall, skyscraping apartments. My children are playing happily, their voices echoing, trying to catch one another, running and falling on the heaps of sand.
I work as a garbage collector, in the near by apartment, and help people dispose their old stuff. People are strange out here. They buy things that they don’t require, keep them for sometime to show and marvel, and then one fine day decide to throw it all out. But I must admit, I have gotten many a things for my household, by digging into people’s trash. That’s where I found that beautiful mirror of mine; I look so pretty in it.
When I got married, I was very excited about the prospect of moving to the city with my husband, far away from the dreary village where I lived. I had my children here, and since then this place has become my world by and large. The nights are dark generally, we don’t have what they call electricity, but we have a kerosene lamp, which we light when the sand factory owner comes to see us. Sometimes it showers, and we know we won’t have anything to eat for the next few days to come, coz no one buys wet sand. Those days, we sleep empty, little drops falling on our faces through the cracked roof, blending in with our tears, taking it just as another snare that God has cast upon us.
The sun sets and shadows begin to show. The kerosene lamp is lit. The sand factory owner has a frown on his face, as he asks us to vacate. A soaring apartment is going take the place. And we are called to clear the heaps of sand…..
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