An accommodation issue and what we might be doing to our planet

This post is out of the extreme experiences I went through in search of an accommodation after being forced to vacate from the institute hostel in the name of water shortage and reconstructions of other hostels. The time was extremely stressful. So stressful that I realised that I have never been in such a situation before. It was too mcuh that I felt going numb and indecisive everyday. Several people were trying to offer solutions, several people were judgemental and made it look like I was making a fuss out of a silly situation. Several even said that we were inefficient at fighting the injustice of being evicted from the hostel. But the only think that can be said to those who judged and accused is, "unless you are in that severe situation you will never understand the gravity of it and why a certain person acted stressfully which you are being judgemental about". But this post is not about that. May be that will be fodder for another post. This post is about the revelations which came out of the 1.5 months long accommodation search in the city I thought was familiar to me.

Now a certain section of the people will think "what is there to be written as a blog; we already know about all these". But hey this is my experience and I am sharing it.

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This search for accommodation took me to places which I thought never existed - not exotic, but dingy and unimaginable for a person who has always had the comfort of a roof over the head. The experience was humbling as well as thought provoking. Humbling because there are people who can only afford to live in those places, the people who get the manual labours done in our daily lives and make it comfortable. A big salute to all of them. Thought provoking because I was hit by the way buildings or structures were constructed.

So the lesson I learnt was that if you have a terrace or free ground, you can make 4 walls, fix a door, and window like structures, make a random toilet and bathroom and rent for high prices and viola you are rich!! Those structures exist in dingy alleys with many buldings together and no air circulation or sunlight coming in. People pay rent and live in these places because real estate is practically not available in a city. So the overall picture you get is that real estate is not available. But what does that imply? It implies that there is no ground which is spared from being claimed by buildings.

If you live in a fancy high rise (with a fancy rent to match) light and air would be there, but the high rise itself is built on some land. If you live in a clustered quarters there also the buildings are occupying some land. That means there is no space for trees to grow! Trees must have been cut down for the city to expand and creep into these occupied spaces. Without trees, there won't be shelter for small animals and birds. Without trees actually there is no relief from the heat of this city which poor people with no ac are forced to bear. But then with ac we would be generating more heat which is released into the atmosphere!!

 Then comes the water issue. The most grappling issue in Chennai. It does not rain, it does not cool down. Nothing can bring any rain to this land! When Chennai floods occured, I heard that there were constructions made over water bodies which added to the severity of the flood. :( So we are not only destroying water sources and adding to the water shortage in summer but also causing floods by constructing in every possible bit of land available. So this goes on in a loop. Contructions are made everywhere including those on water reservoirs because more and more people need accommodaiton in the city. But the same contructions cause shortate of water to the people who live in those contructions!!

The water issue is very serious. Especially if you are a woman. Imagine a woman living in the aforementioned dingy situation without water. People worry about safety of women while they have to live in a city. Forget safety the women and children living in these places may not even have access to water which is a basic necessity. But no you cannot imagine unless you have seen or been to such a place all by yourself atleast once.

The thoughts go on. There is no water and you rely on tankers which bring water from god knows where. You have plenty of sea water but the ocean is polluted with plastic. To know the amount of plastic pollution in the sea all you have to take a stroll to Elliot's beach and try and stand in the waves and have plastic and thermocoal washing over your feet. :/ If makes you feels so filthy that it defeats the whole purpose of going to the seashore and standing in the waves.  Land is polluted, air polluted, sea polluted...

Combine these realisations and stress with the heat in which you were forced to go and search for accommodation. If you didn't believe in global warming and climate change you would become a convert! It is so unbearably hot outside. All these experiences make you wonder, "what are we doing to our planet"? On a social basis, people come to cities to fulfill their dreams or to get better paid jobs. But cities also happen to be the most polluted and lacking proper hygiene when so many people cluster together. We cannot snap away half of the people from cities like Thanos did. But we should serioulsy think about controlling population, or providing better life and job opportunities from places where people migrate to the cities. Otherwise there will always be the tug of war between the obvious right to have a good life and the way people end up actually living in search of a good life. Obviously the way cities are now, majority of people who do not earn well are forced to live a not so good life (but may be compared to the rural settings where they come from these bad city conditions may be much better for them in terms of a job). And the many buildings built to accommodate the people coming to cities in search of jobs are not doing any justice to the environment and the planet.

That we are nearing an inevitable future which involves calamities caused by climate change is scary. Either it rains too heavily or there is no water. It is high time to think and find solutions where everybody gets justice. We need to have solutions to save the environment and our planet.

The whole search was for accommodation, a roof over your head and a place to sleep and live safely. But what it taught and reminded me was a serious lesson. The lesson that unless we pay real attention to the condition of our planet now, we will not have our primary home left in our immediate future.
If you don't believe, you are welcome to walk through the city during day time and search for accommodation...