Directionless Creature

There are n or should I say n+1 studies and surveys that indicate or rather prove that women are bad at directions and reading maps. I had always wondered what maps got to do with the sex and lived happily thinking that these organisms are as good or bad as men. All this until the following real life incident.

Now to understand this in and out without any kind of question on our minds we have to go back at least 23 years when god decided to add another woman to the population of this already over burdened earth. But earth had to accept this creature the way president Musharaff agrees on everything Bush says. Some kind of current passes through my whole body when I think that 23 years ago the seeds were sowed to change my views and thinking.

As the kid grew she eventually realized that she was having great difficulty and needed Herculean effort to make out the difference between the directions right and left. Every time she needed to decide on either of the two sides, correctly she used to end up deciding the wrong one.

When she was 12 years old she decided to end this speculation forever. She etched a small cut on her right hand such that it left a permanent mark. I can bet that she would have done this after watching some hindi movie in which mother of twins draws a moustache on one of them in order to differentiate between them. It was not her fault at all because every true Indian gets influenced by bollywood in some way or the other.

She was living happily after that one painful incident. Every time she needed to decide between right and left she swiftly used to look at one of her hand. If scar, right, else left.

She grew to become one of the most brilliant students of her class in both school and college but only insiders knew the secret. Today after 11 years another painful and yet funny incident occurred.

It was 9.00 pm and she was desperate to get back home. Therefore, she decided to hire a taxi instead of walking. Unfortunately, our man was new in the area and did not know the place she wanted to go. She decided to direct him and boarded the taxi. She told him to go straight until the end of the road where she got in. Preoccupied with something or someone else she did not note that it was pitch dark and the only source of light was the taxi’s head light.

Taxi reached the end of that road and the driver asked which way to turn. As usual she looked at her hand but to her surprise she was not able decided if the mark was actually present or not. She looked at the other hand for some help but in vain. She was just not able to decide what to say. She was in the most critical situation of her life. She froze, blood stopped circulating and even before the driver asked for the second time she had decided that she was lost and might not reach home at all. Driver asked for another couple of times but with her terrorized soul she did not know what to tell the driver.

Finally, she leaned forward and with her hand she showed the driver which way to turn. Great presence of mind, I must say. She some how reached home that day but all of us listening to this incident were rolling on the floor laughing.