Whenever my mind is not busy in
generating any productive thoughts (which is very often), my philosophical mind
jumps in action fiddling with some random thoughts. I start reasoning about the
things happening in my surrounding, people perambulating around and so on. I
start studying faces of people and try to guess what is going on in their mind.
Not that I am good at face-reading or something, but it is always fun to do
such exercises and keep your brain busy in free time.
The
best time to enjoy doing such weird things is when you are in a crowded place,
surrounded by people of all sorts and strata. When I am in court, donning the
black coat, absorbing the heat and waiting for the lift to help me traverse
from one floor to the other, instead of getting irritated for the long wait, I
glance at the faces of people-lawyers, judges, police, clients and people
accompanying them. Some are sad that they have to go through a robe routine and
it is just another day for them. Some are always pumped with energy because
they are ultimately doing what they like to do. Others think that this way or
that, they have to earn bread for their family so why not by doing this work.
Some have plain, insipid faces without any reason.
When the
police are taking away some criminals, those criminals too, are of assorted
expressions. There are a few hardened criminals who carry the “to hell with the
world, I will not change” attitude on their face. Then there are those who,
even in their worst nightmares had never imagined that they would land up in
jail some day and hence carry a guilt-laden face. Handful others are as
shameless while being whisked away by the police as they were during the
commitment of crime for which they are being tried. People accompanying these
criminals wear only one expression-of being helpless and hapless. Apart from
court there are number of other places where we can study human psychology at
its best and vivid angles.
“Scared”-was
my instantaneous expression when long ago, as a child, I first saw local trains
in Mumbai. I wondered how so many people lived in one city at one time and
where does everyone have to go throughout the day since locals would always be
occupied to the capacity. This curiosity awakened the ‘face reading genius’ in
me. Suddenly the monstrous population started looking like an interesting
puzzle to me. People were conveying various messages, quite involuntarily, through
their face. There were those accepting life as it came and made full use of
whatever little free time they could get and there were those dejected to see
their fates oscillating in the local trains and then there were a few others who
had mastered the art of contentedness with a statement “That’s life!”, stamped
on their face. As I started observing people, travelling in a local had become
enjoyable or at least tolerable. Since then it felt more like browsing through
a library, each person an encyclopaedia in himself.
There are
many such places like our neighbourhood, social events, family functions where
we can find umpteen species of a genre called ‘People’. So next time when you
are surrounded by number of people and you don’t have any work you know what to
do. But be watchful of your actions as someone else might also be studying your
face and facets to your personality.
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