About 30% of the fresh water that reaches home is used to flush toilets. That’s why he didn’t flush it. He left it unattended. He saved his share of water.
Reading about the environmental impacts that his breed has imposed on nature he evolved into a concerned mammal.
All of a sudden he started attending seminars and symposium on how to save earth. A lot of information was shared. Heavy topics like Global warming, Polar ice caps, Oil eating bacteria, annual rainfall, CFC’s, Poverty,H1N1and Energy conservation were discussed in a 7000 square feet room centrally air conditioned and attended by 17-20 people. The breaks were unbelievably gregarious with oily dishes and boxes of tissue papers with people squatting about their ruthless bosses and the latest movies released.
“A news paper costs a tree.” The chief guest of the meeting had made the audience think. Does tissue paper cost trees as well?
He stared at a chart erected on a metal frame at the centre of the hall. It had a immense data for his underdeveloped, orthodox, typical engineer brain to process.
Every minute 55,757 barrel of petrol is used. (A few days later he brought a cycle.)
Every minute there are 107deaths and 15die from starvation.(He gave up Dominoe’s)
The meeting ended with the chief guest leaving abruptly between heated arguments. A few photographers took snaps of the dignitaries on the stage whispering to each other.
He couldn’t sleep that night. The pictures of scantly clad African kids scavenging amidst war debris for food packets and Rajasthani women traveling 20 km to get fresh water kept reeling in his head. He got up to tighten the leaky tap at the end of the hallway in his ‘1 BHK’ apartment. He switched of his refrigerator. Rain was beating against his window. ‘Huge drops of fresh water’ he thought. Rain water harnessing was a topic of discussion when he was in college. He remembered how is college had a rain water storage tank. (a concrete wall was built around a naturally occurring pond). Rain water should be harnessed. He went to his bathroom and took a green bucket and ran to his terrace. The terrace was slippery and a bolt of lightning flashed across the sky. The next morning he would have harnessed a bucket of water. Fresh. Cool. Yellow, with dust and a particular taste.
He did not press his shirts today. The tie was left numb and lazy, hanging across his neck. ‘Iron boxes, washing machines and vacuum cleaners burn electricity’. Nobody in his office gave a damn about what he wore. He knew that even if he walked in his manager would fire him only for not meeting dead lines and the diplomats in his nearby cubicles would give their daily nodes. He wouldnt be noticed amidst the thousands of average IT persons in
The afternoon lunch was totally herbal. He didn’t eat chicken or meat. He drank barely enough water. He didn’t waste food. He looked outside the window at the pale greenery blurred in the midday sun. ‘It must be raining somewhere else in the world’.
A guy in a funny tie handed him a pamphlet as he walked out of his office. “God is watching you”. A pamphlet cost a tree. ‘But god made trees’ he thought. The pamphlet ended with the remark “make ten copies of this pamphlet or the wrath of heaven shall come upon thee”.
He walked into his room and drank a glass of rainwater he had saved earlier. The rest of the bucket was used to flush his toilet. There was an envelope from the bank. ‘Pay the interest on the housing loan at the earliest’. ‘Does Envelops cost trees??’. He switched on the TV. Half a dozen bombings in
The northwest sky turned into an eerie glow. The twilight subsided and he was left in the yellow light of room. The scent of boredom filled the single bedroom. He took out a piece of paper from his notepad. He started writing on it.
‘ I don’t know why I am doing this. I don’t think there is any point in pursuing a meaningless life. No one else is responsible for my death’.
Rain was beating against his window. ‘Huge drops of fresh water’ he thought. He left the note near the table lamp.
Suicide note on a piece of paper …. that’s one tree lesser…
http://www.grinningplanet.com/2007/03-13/environmental-hypocrites.htm
