Behind the office is a little lane that offers a fantastic short cut to the main road. Last week there was a drainage leak and part of the street filled up with the black, murky water of the drain. A week later it is status quo. The water remains as is. Some kind soul has put stones that people hop skip and jump across to reach their homes. And I heard people mumbling “we hope somebody will come to repair it.”

A client owes us big money. Every other day we send a person to his office. And he sends the person back saying – come back on so and so day. It’s like we are obliged to him in some way! And our accountant sighs and says “Hope the next time he will give the money. I’m tired of waiting for it to come.”

My maid’s daughter procured over 90% marks in her 12th standard board exams last year. Everyone was elated. And she hoped that the marks would automatically get her admission in some college. But that was not to be. Last year the girl did not get admission anywhere. This year too my maid was hoping that the girl would get admission (considering she has done a computer course in the interim). But we took things in hand – and spoke to a lecturer we know and somehow managed to get the girl admission for a B Com course. Yes my maid’s hope did come true – with a lot of help from everyone!

Construction work is happening on our road. They have piled up the debris on the road – causing massive traffic chaos. We tell them to move it and they act very congenial and say they will do it right away. And it simply stays there. They have no intention of moving it. We hesitate to tell them again in the hope that they will move it soon.

We wait at the station to receive someone. The train arrives late. We accept its delay easily and hope that it will at least come at the revised time.

The garbage from the street does not get cleaned up. We sigh and say – hope that at least someone will come tomorrow and clean it.

We ask for a call taxi to arrive at a particular time. He does not arrive. We call him and he says – he is on his way and asks for address and other details. An hour later, we are still waiting, hoping that he will arrive. And we are of course terribly late!

There is a power cut. When we call the electricity board they say that repair work is going on, it may come in an hour. An hour later it still does not come – so we call back – and no one picks up the phone. We twiddle our thumbs and hope that the power will come back soon. What else can we do?

Like an old lady covering up her wrinkles with make up, we cover up our flaws with the word ‘hope’. And we move on. Hoping that one day someone, somewhere, somehow will make things better. As Indians we seem to have the tendency to cover everything from apathy, to ineptitude, to lethargy to negligence…with hope.

Will this trend ever change? One lives in hope…