I’m not sure where this story begins.
Memories of the day are fragmented. The words in my head struggle to make phrases tonight.
It wasn’t the plan this morning. Not even at breakfast when Viktor was explaining that it’s possible, and maybe even interesting, to do something and document it at the same time.
Was it this evening, when the last production vendor backed out completely? No, that’s where the story ends.
It might have been a couple of days ago, when people here began to tell us that we need Bengali decorators. Jaisalmer cannot handle it. They have never seen anything on this scale. When an order is placed for 1100 tables, they say, “Take 800. Why 1100? 800 is enough. ...Take it!”
They have never experienced the intended quality either. When they put up stages, the benchmark is to be somewhat certain that it won’t fall down.
The festival is in a week. Except for Gajinder Singh who is putting up the Swiss Tents, everybody who got on board to build the festival has waited till the last minute to abscond. The team is now doing everything on their own. ‘Everything’ is not as small a word as it seems.
Neither is ‘team’.
But back to the Bengali decorators. We expect twelve of them tomorrow. We expect – we hope – they can deliver on the dream. I have my doubts. Bengalis are notorious rice-eaters. Rice makes you sleepy. And there is nothing lazier than a well fed Bengali.
I hope I’m wrong.
There is so much to be done. And they need doing.
So I put down the notebook and picked up a measuring tape. I was on-site with the deputies all day, marking every ten metres of both sides of every pathway on the festival site. The festival site is about a square kilometre big.
What a day.
On the field, there are three things I realised.
One is that making a straight line is not as easy as it seems. Not on undulating sand, and not when the line is 150 metres long. Especially when it’s not just one line that you’re making.
The other is that chalk is about as effective to mark spots in the desert as sand. One baby sandstorm wipes everything clean.
So we went back over the lines, this time with bamboos. We ran with them, racing the setting sun for daylight. We put bamboos down at every ten metres, everywhere we had already made the chalk markings. Tomorrow, when the decorators arrive, they just have to fit those bamboos in.
A few hours saved.
And then this news about the last production vendor backing out. A dark end to the evening.
Today was tiring. We got back at 8:30, Deputy S and I, the last remaining soldiers on the field. I melted into a chair the moment I sat down. My spine went limp, my jaw dropped and my eyes looked to the heavens for comfort.
The stars further disoriented me.
Which brings me to the third thing I realised on-site.
It was tiring but the deputies I rubbed shoulders with today have been doing this every day. Every day. In case someone forgets when everything is done and people have come and had a great time and gone home and the site has been cleared of every remnant of these memories – this is how the war was won.
Memories of the day are fragmented. The words in my head struggle to make phrases tonight.
It wasn’t the plan this morning. Not even at breakfast when Viktor was explaining that it’s possible, and maybe even interesting, to do something and document it at the same time.
Was it this evening, when the last production vendor backed out completely? No, that’s where the story ends.
It might have been a couple of days ago, when people here began to tell us that we need Bengali decorators. Jaisalmer cannot handle it. They have never seen anything on this scale. When an order is placed for 1100 tables, they say, “Take 800. Why 1100? 800 is enough. ...Take it!”
They have never experienced the intended quality either. When they put up stages, the benchmark is to be somewhat certain that it won’t fall down.
The festival is in a week. Except for Gajinder Singh who is putting up the Swiss Tents, everybody who got on board to build the festival has waited till the last minute to abscond. The team is now doing everything on their own. ‘Everything’ is not as small a word as it seems.
Neither is ‘team’.
But back to the Bengali decorators. We expect twelve of them tomorrow. We expect – we hope – they can deliver on the dream. I have my doubts. Bengalis are notorious rice-eaters. Rice makes you sleepy. And there is nothing lazier than a well fed Bengali.
I hope I’m wrong.
There is so much to be done. And they need doing.
So I put down the notebook and picked up a measuring tape. I was on-site with the deputies all day, marking every ten metres of both sides of every pathway on the festival site. The festival site is about a square kilometre big.
What a day.
On the field, there are three things I realised.
One is that making a straight line is not as easy as it seems. Not on undulating sand, and not when the line is 150 metres long. Especially when it’s not just one line that you’re making.
The other is that chalk is about as effective to mark spots in the desert as sand. One baby sandstorm wipes everything clean.
So we went back over the lines, this time with bamboos. We ran with them, racing the setting sun for daylight. We put bamboos down at every ten metres, everywhere we had already made the chalk markings. Tomorrow, when the decorators arrive, they just have to fit those bamboos in.
A few hours saved.
And then this news about the last production vendor backing out. A dark end to the evening.
Today was tiring. We got back at 8:30, Deputy S and I, the last remaining soldiers on the field. I melted into a chair the moment I sat down. My spine went limp, my jaw dropped and my eyes looked to the heavens for comfort.
The stars further disoriented me.
Which brings me to the third thing I realised on-site.
It was tiring but the deputies I rubbed shoulders with today have been doing this every day. Every day. In case someone forgets when everything is done and people have come and had a great time and gone home and the site has been cleared of every remnant of these memories – this is how the war was won.
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