Monday 25 August, 2008

'Whose' tomatoes' were they anyways?

A middle aged man went to a vegetable shop and asked for one kilogram of tomatoes. As the man was putting tomatoes into the basket, he realized that a few of them were rotten and asked the vegetable seller to throw them out of the stock otherwise they will spoil the entire lot of tomatoes. The man bought his one kg of the best tomatoes and left. The rotten lot did not belong to him.

Then, the vegetable seller decided to separate the rotten tomatoes from the fresh lot and put them in a basket. After he was done with his work, he threw the basket of rotten tomatoes into the municipal dustbin. So, the rotten bunch didn't belong to him either.

After a while, a pitiable lady with torn clothes saw the basket and started searching for the 'not so rotten' tomatoes in the basket. For her, those tomatoes could prove to be a day's full meal. But as soon as she sat down to check the basket, a goat came running and put her head into the basket to eat the tomatoes. The lady tried to push the goat away but it was not that easy.

Now, we had a fight between a human and an animal for those rotten tomatoes, which any one of us would never even care to look at. The wrestle was on and there was no visible winner. I just stood there to see who is going to have the last say.

Suddenly a big truck came in and I realized it was the Municipality garbage truck that comes to clean the garage bins everyday. Without even looking at what was happening, the driver hooked the big dustbin, lifted it up and landed on his truck and left. Both the poor lady and the goat left the place in a normal manner and then I realized it could have been a usual story for them.

None of them got that lot of tomatoes and may be no one will. But I still think who actually deserved the tomatoes and I cannot find an answer. If you have one, do let me know?

According to Mamkol, “The easiest way to eradicate economic disparity between the people is to kill the poor.”

7 comments:

Nivedita Mishra said...

It is strange how we miss such things happening around us everyday, but when depicted in words, it penetrates deep down. It’s a beautiful piece of writing.

Tawheed Rehman said...

I don't know. Am allergic to tumeytows. Since the fruit, that is eaten as a vegetable, is a native to South America, I guess we should ask them.

Hey, you make me proud Mr. Social Entrepreneur. All the very best.

Unknown said...

Hey man, awakening alarm and alerts for the society, the issue of poverty has been there for ages and we seem to be insensitive towards it. The basic problems have taken a back seat in this era where we think the bigger issues like terrorism and global warning

Unknown said...

Duty towards the society is “history” and it is “ME” who matters the most in this rate race . . .

Anonymous said...

They'll end up where they came from, the earth. And quite rightly so. No living being deserves to eat rotten tomatoes.

Anonymous said...

too many tomatoes

TASHIF AYAZ said...

@Anonymous: Actually there aren't many left for us