It had been a fair while. I wasn’t sure if she’d remember. But was she gorgeous… a flame haired beauty with the most soulful eyes in the world… though a child I was, I knew what I had felt then was something not far from the neighbourhood of love. Her name – Pinky, was the only dampener. Nothing against the name … just didn’t suit her. But I didn’t care… I remembered the first time we’d met… I remembered her touch… that gentle caress as she held my hand. No words, but we did have a moment there…
I burst through the gates and ran towards the doorway where I had last seen her… it
had been a bit like that scene from “Dilwale…” She’d walked away into that dark corridor, and just before crossing into her cell, she had turned back… and looked… for a moment that had seemed like it would last an eternity, and it had… As I ran towards that same dark corridor, my heart beat to strange rhythms… there was joy, anticipation… and fear… it surprised me. It wasn’t an emotion I had expected… perhaps I was worried - would she still remember me? Would she still be there? Of course she would, I told myself… where could she go…?
Breathless and exhausted, and with my heart pounding away, I threw myself on the walls of the precinct and peered over the edge... she wasn’t there… I went around the back, towards the corridor… not there either. I walked up to the guard. He seemed bored… “Pinky?”, he pondered, and then, as he dragged the very last wisp of smoke from his bidi, he added “Woh toh gayi, sir… she’s gone.” Where to? I was shocked… was she… “Dead!” he said. “Ab to kaafi time hogaya…” I looked around at the empty cell in disbelief… my legs felt wobbly and I felt my eyes well over… the warm wet tears a strange comfort in the cold dry November winds… How could she die? She was only 15, young, even for an Orangutan… I trudged back through the zoo, back the way I’d come. I was sad and miserable. And the place seemed depressing… In that moment, I’d grown up and had begun to see the zoo for what it was…
I must have been 14 or so, but until that day, in a zoo, I’d been like Alice in Wonderland, enchanted by the proximity of beasts and birds, hitherto, unaware of the terrible crimes this institution had been committing on its inmates. And inmates they were, incarcerated for life and destined to die, well before their years, of illness and disease if lucky, or boredom if not. Pinky, I was told died of both… ....Continue
I burst through the gates and ran towards the doorway where I had last seen her… it
had been a bit like that scene from “Dilwale…” She’d walked away into that dark corridor, and just before crossing into her cell, she had turned back… and looked… for a moment that had seemed like it would last an eternity, and it had… As I ran towards that same dark corridor, my heart beat to strange rhythms… there was joy, anticipation… and fear… it surprised me. It wasn’t an emotion I had expected… perhaps I was worried - would she still remember me? Would she still be there? Of course she would, I told myself… where could she go…?Breathless and exhausted, and with my heart pounding away, I threw myself on the walls of the precinct and peered over the edge... she wasn’t there… I went around the back, towards the corridor… not there either. I walked up to the guard. He seemed bored… “Pinky?”, he pondered, and then, as he dragged the very last wisp of smoke from his bidi, he added “Woh toh gayi, sir… she’s gone.” Where to? I was shocked… was she… “Dead!” he said. “Ab to kaafi time hogaya…” I looked around at the empty cell in disbelief… my legs felt wobbly and I felt my eyes well over… the warm wet tears a strange comfort in the cold dry November winds… How could she die? She was only 15, young, even for an Orangutan… I trudged back through the zoo, back the way I’d come. I was sad and miserable. And the place seemed depressing… In that moment, I’d grown up and had begun to see the zoo for what it was…
I must have been 14 or so, but until that day, in a zoo, I’d been like Alice in Wonderland, enchanted by the proximity of beasts and birds, hitherto, unaware of the terrible crimes this institution had been committing on its inmates. And inmates they were, incarcerated for life and destined to die, well before their years, of illness and disease if lucky, or boredom if not. Pinky, I was told died of both… ....Continue
