HUNTING FOR A HOUSE--ONE

Hunting for a House--One

I was living happily as a tenant in a house for the past nearly five years; a house which I, in my opinion, deserved neither by status nor by financial means.  How I came to I occupy it as a tenant could be the subject of another story altogether.  Although I was generally happy living there, during the past few months I was feeling uncomfortable continuing to be a tenant there, due to certain reasons, which appear now, in hindsight, rather inexplicable.  At the time, however, I was unsuccessfully rejecting those reasons, although  I recognized them to be irrational.  It is like our ambivalent attitude towards God, whom we, as adults, rationally reject, but at the same time irrationally fear, and ultimately, settle down to appease, rationalizing that we do not wish to hurt our parents and the society, but, in truth, appease to be on the safe side, lest we incur the wrath of the Almighty.   Summarizing my state of mind, I vaguely desired to shift to another house but could not see any reasonable reason I should.    

A few days after my birthday this year, I was deeply ruminating on the futility of all existence, in particular, of mine.  I was wondering what I had achieved through all the years of my existence; at the same time I was groping for a defensible definition of “achievement”. Mercifully, I heard the cell phone ringing, pulling me out of a possible descent into depression.  When I answered it, it was the landlady urging me urgently, in a trembling voice, to descend to her ground floor.  I did so, unable to understand the urgency, as I was up-to-date in the payment of all bills, including the monthly rent.   However, deciding that the ground floor was preferable to depression, more than willingly I made the descent.

She received me at the door with a grave expression and ushered me into the house.  I knew where she was heading, as the floor plan of the ground floor was the same as the first.  It was the kitchen.  Was it some fantastic dish she had prepared which she wanted me to taste straight from the stove?  I dismissed the idea as most unlikely under the present circumstance, when, as a confirmation of my conclusion, she stopped at the door to the kitchen and said, “Take a look”.  I did so promptly.  The kitchen was a perfect set for a horror movie.  The floor was completely strewn with chunks of plaster, of all sizes, which had fallen from the ceiling.  In other words, the ceiling was on the floor.  I stood there, frozen, speechless, for what appeared to be a hundred years.  Then, the first thought that appeared in my frozen head was, “how fortunate, no one was in the kitchen, when it happened.”  She almost echoed my thoughts, “Thank God, no one was in the kitchen when this happened.” At the time, I never imagined that that would be the reasonable reason for me to move out of the house. 

She consulted three engineers, all of whom gave the same advice, “Demolish and reconstruct.  The builder had used sea-sand. The problem would recur, even if repaired.”  Finally, she decided to demolish the house and construct apartments.  When she called me one day and informed me of her decision, I recollected my indescribable discomfort and the vague desire to vacate. 

With that began my hunt for another house.  Believe me, that is the most daunting task I have ever faced.  When one has lived for a long time in a house, the comforts of the house one has configured and enjoyed    block the vision from seeing the comforts of the houses inspected for possible occupation.  It appears to be a matter of mental readjustment; it takes time to ease the old house out and see the new houses with an open mind.  However, there are certain indisputable aspects in a house which stick out as sore thumbs.                                                           

One of the apartments located on the ground floor had windows with wooden panes opening within and horizontal iron bars were fixed on the outside.   When I went into the rooms and opened the windows, I was staring at multi-coloured clothes and undergarments of the watchman, hanging from the window bars for drying: a good preview of the colourful day one could look forward to, early every morning!

Another house had such a small strip of a kitchen, which allowed only one person to move at a time and no dining area at all: a house most suited to house a rishi who had no need for material sustenance to sustain his spiritual evolution, perhaps. 

I stumbled upon another house, which I was prepared to rent, despite all its shortcomings, but the owner put me on to his sister-in-law who demanded a commission of one month’s rent, although she neither brought the vacant house to my attention nor was she a broker.  Further, when I attempted to negotiate the rent and other terms, she said that I should discuss those matters with the owner, upon which I inquired why I should pay her commission when she was not prepared to do anything for me.  Most annoyed at the question, she asserted that that was the way it was; an assertion one hears day in day out from almost everyone when he or she has no rational argument to support the point under dispute.  She further informed me that when the tenancy agreement was renewed every eleven months, I would be required to pay her a commission of one month’s rent.  I politely advised her to work to earn money and disconnected the line.  (To be continued in part two)

November 29, 2009