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Showing posts from November, 2011

Joy of a Rustic Life

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O ften at around five 5 p.m., I go out for an evening walk around my neighborhood or to a shopping area nearby. Yesterday as I was out on a walk, I spotted a group of around ten rural laborers returning from work at some construction site in the area. They were indeed a bubbly and cheerful lot, laughing and joking with each other as they walked briskly towards their temporary urban shelter. The exuberance was certainly far greater than other rich or middle class neighbors that I encounter on these evening walks. It is a common sight most evenings. These simple rustic labor folk that drop into the city from time to time from nearby rural areas do so to make some extra money. In recent years there has been much economic progress in India, but such progress is in the main confined to urban areas. In the villages, life has not yet changed substantially. Most villagers are farmers but their farm holding are small and they do not have money to invest in intensive modern farming. As a