My wife and I live half the time of the year in the state of California in this great country, the United States of America simply because both our children, our son and daughter (and their families) have settled down here after they finished their education and started working. We love this country for many, many obvious reasons. Nice well maintained roads, beautiful public parks with lush greenery, disciplined traffic conditions, schools with their large playgrounds, general cleanliness, good public services, so on and so forth.
But given a choice, we still feel more happy and comfortable in our good old Pune in India! I had the occasion today to talk about this with my daughter with whom I was driving to pick up her younger son, my grandson, from a music class. And let me say, it is only when I am accompanying her or my son, son in law or daughter in law on such errands that I get to talk to them at length on any subject. Rest of the time, they are too busy for such mundane things like talking with retired seniors like me! Does not matter, let me come back to my conversation with my daughter this evening.
We were comparing life here and in India, mainly social life and interactions and were in general agreement that it is more warm, close and satisfying in India than here. Why it should be so is a matter of debate and analysis of many factors affecting people who have made this country their home. But I argued with her, what is noteworthy about India is that all your neighbours are your friends even if not very close. You can easily chat with a passerby for a few minutes on something or the other. Here, you may say hi to a dozen people every day while on walks without any real conversation. You hardly see or know your neighbours even when you have lived on the same street for decades!
In an emergency, the first thing we do in India is to knock on the doors of your neighbour. Here, the first thing you would do is to call 911 which is fine and another subject not under discussion. This is not to say that people are not helpful here. But they prefer to keep distance for reasons which perhaps also include legalities. Houses and the lawns in front are neat and tidy. You will notice a number of cars in front of the garages. But you never see anyone out except when they are getting in or out of their cars. There is simply no question of finding kids playing in the streets!
Basically, my daughter and I were talking about people, humans who appear to have taken a back seat of sorts. The small town atmosphere which is still in abundance in large parts of India is conspicuous by it's absence in the area we live in here. I was wondering if it is still there in small towns in the hinterlands of America across east, west, north and south. Is our society in developed countries, thanks to science is paying a price for too much progress, development, advances in all fields?
And that brings me to the question of what is too much progress! Is there any limit laid down anywhere by anyone? It is just not possible considering what man has achieved already. After the truly revolutionary advent of wheels ages back to flying into inner and outer space, landings on moon and Mars, we still can not fathom what is possible on our planet, the earth itself. Driverless cars is one of those things. My elder grandson who is crazy about cars responded in disgust with these words to this latest possibility; 'what is the point of having a car which you do not have the pleasure to drive! Ridiculous!'
I suppose only a child has the insight to bring the society at large to it's senses in it's senseless pursuits of progress and development, with such observations. What is scary is that in the not too distant future, human beings would become obsolete on our planet which will be run by robots!
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