Look or Stare

I saw this boy the other day. In the park. 

Jumping up and down and trying to run, taking rounds – clockwise and otherwise, purely at random. Extremely happy and with full of energy, he was all over the park. While his parents were walking somewhere else in the park, strictly following the ground rules laid down in BOLD letters by the authorities, and also constantly looking at the google-watch-like gadget fitted on their hands, checking how good they were performing that day.

Then I saw this gentleman staring at this boy. He did not remove his eyes on him for a long period of time, turning around and looking him again. That made me realise two things. One – the boy is wearing a pair of highly sophisticated spectacles with a unique design - either they arrived from the US or the boy himself had arrived from US wearing those glasses. Two – the staring gentleman is none other than the person I keep seeing  in the nearby shop Kumar opticals , sitting at the counter looking eagerly for half-blind people to enter his shop! Obviously he had a reason to look at this boy closely.

“We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are” – Anais Nin.

If you are a TV news reader and more inclined to Roman culture, you will not be able to appreciate the Chinese way of thinking, you may end up in seeing and pronouncing the Chinese Premier's name as "Eleven Jinping" ( instead of Xi Jinping ) and you might lose your job.

If I have something to buy in mind, my attention will go towards things that are similar on the road. I have been thinking of giving a break to the front gate of my house, before it breaks by itself as its expiry date had crossed several years ago! So what do I do? When I venture out for a morning walk, I stop and start looking at each and every gate in front of the houses on the way. That action of mine is good enough to take me into custody for questioning by that cop, who has been following me getting initially suspicious by my rather clumsy morning dress – my looking and parsing each gate will just reconfirm his reading that I am planning to break into one of the weaker but richer houses that night!

One day I suddenly had a desire to buy a new pair of Jeans. To me Jeans is one of the biggest inventions of this century, which will help in optimising resources apart from covering the nakedness! One unstated advantage of the jeans, which not a single marketing agency dared to announce till date publicly, is that “Wash once, wear for ever”. In my opinion our government should pass a resolution immediately that dress code in all offices should mandatorily be jeans. Especially in urban areas where water of any use is at premium, and jeans is everywhere! 

To select Jeans of my liking, before going to a multi-brand cloth shop and try myself, I have a better option to start with. Watch closely all the Jeans-clad people on the road. I would find real fat people went easily into their Jeans, which will demonstrate the “stretch-ability” of it. If I am more particular and daring, I can go very near to those shabby ones and take a deep breath - to see how much it smells, to know whether the fabric is new in the market, deodorant-capable or not.

Looking or observing a person in front of you is an art. You should observe everything in as much detail as possible without the other party realising it. And remember, there is a thin line between looking and staring. If you fix your eyes at one place extended by a few more seconds, the look gets subtly translated into a stare even without your knowledge.  And also remember, there is a fine print in our rule books, which says any type of stare can be considered as an attempt to sexually harass somebody! 

So beware and never allow your look extend into a stare unnecessarily. If the other party decides to go to a police station once to register your “expected” behaviour, rest assured - you have to go to the same police station many more times to convince them that it was natural and purely unexpected.