day 95

I decided to take an autorickshaw to go into town since I was feeling lazy to drive.

The rick had stopped at a gas station to fill gas and I sat there fiddling with my camera.

It was around 3 pm and I guess it was coffee time for the employees at the gas station. Because in rolled a mobile-tea-stall-on-wheels. It's nothing but a bicycle that's used to carry bags of milk packets and other paraphernalia that you usually need to make coffee or tea. And you find many such mobile-tea-stalls in Bangalore.

Suddenly I saw this really shabby dog appearing out of no where. And he just sat by the side of the mobile tea stall, like an obedient dog waiting for his turn to be served tea.

His white coat was more grey-black than white. His ear was clipped in one corner. I had never seen a dirtier dog than this mongrel, but oh there was something about him. There was a certain energy about him, a certain goodness about him that you wanted to reach out and pat him on the head and say, "Good boy". He seemed like the smartest dog around the block.

At that precise moment I didn't know what was so compelling about the image. I quickly raised my camera and clicked a picture. There was no time to think since my auto rickshaw was now ready to go tuk-tuk.


When I came back home as I was staring at this image I realised that it was really a very abstract shot. You couldn't see the dog's face. You couldn't see anybody's face for that matter. Even the mobile tea stall appears like blocks of color. But somehow there was a lot of feeling to the pic. A certain humanness about it. I could literally feel the joy and the eagerness of the mutt not just hoping but absolutely believing that the man on the cycle will ultimately give him some milk and also a biscuit. There was a not-so-quite confidence about this dog.

It reminded me of certain spirited people who even when they are down will spring up by the sheer force of their confidence in their belief that everything will turn out well in the end.