Fousiya had migrated to the city a decade back with her husband when he had come looking for work here. After his passing away, a few years back, she had took to preparing & selling hot snacks in the afternoon, at the back of her small house. These days, with a lot of restaurants and other outlets, the customers coming to her shop, situated in a narrow lane, had decreased and her meagre income from the same was dwindling by the day.
Pravin and Raju whenever they frequented this part of the city did make it a habit to visit Fousiya’s place in the evening to take a bite and also a parcel back home. They knew her from college days as their common friend Jiten lived nearby. With Jiten migrating to the gulf, their visits to this part also came down.
Today, Fousiya had prepared more snacks and as it was the last day of the holy fasting month, she was expecting a slight increase in her clientele. The summer was at its peak and she was feeling tired after preparing the snacks. By 4 PM in the afternoon, she has arranged them properly and sat in an old creaking chair waiting for her buyers. Minutes went by and barring a couple of solitary kids who bought a few, no one had turned up yet . The clock struck 5 in her house and the chimes brought her back from a nap. Another couple of buyers turned up and went with a packet of assortments from her snacks. Still there was no sight of her regular customers that day. Had she miscalculated her preparation for the day. Maybe there was half an hour left before the breaking of the fast and people might turn up any moment now, she thought.
Seconds ticked away, so also the minutes and she could hear her heart beats in that silence. Something was amiss that day, no one walked by, what was it, she was wondering that kept her customers away. It was 5 mins to Iftar time and she was wondering what she would do with the preparations she had made for the day. That is when a smiling Pravin walked with Raju chatting on the phone. Looking at Fousiya’s anxious face, Pravin could sense something was wrong and he could somehow gather the reason by looking at the unsold snacks. There was a time, if one got to her shop after 5 PM, there would be nothing left to buy and here it was 6:30 in the evening and it looked she hadn’t made a single sale.
Pravin nudged Raju so hard, that he had to hurriedly cut his call with the party on the phone. “Look Raju, we have got everything here what we wanted for Asim’s iftar party” in a loud voice. After making the usual inquiries, Pravin asked if he can take the entire snacks on display. Asim? Raju enquired of Pravin, “and who is that?” when Fousiya had gone inside to collect some parcel wrappers. “Asim is our friend”, smiled Pravin, “who was conjured up just now as a helping hand to Fousiya didi. Looks like she was not able to sell her snacks today. I do not want to spoil her Eid”. Raju understood as many a time, the generous Pravin was quick to sense and help people whom he came across in his day to day life, whether he knew them or not…
Perceptions 