Life in villages seems to be rustic and miserly too. Some years back I brought my mother to Bangalore to treat her psychiatric disorder. She responded well to the therapy and after six months I took her back to my village.
The drugs were still in excess for a month and it was to be abandoned as per the advice of the psychiatrist who had treated my mother. He had cautioned us “let it be buried under the earth so that nobody would make ‘use’ of it.”

So immediately after reaching home we directed our domestic help, Kunchi, to throw the drugs in the stream running in front of our house. The same evening the maid developed uneasiness and had vomiting, giddiness, etc. On enquiry, she said she didn’t throw the medicines and, since they were costly, thought she can take them for her own wellbeing. In fact, she did consume a few of them in the morning.

We took her to a doctor and explained the reasons for her ill health. In a short while, he gave the necessary medicines to stop the effects of the psychiatric medicines. Self practice of allopathic medicines would have calamitous effect, and innocence won’t be an excuse.

In fact, Kunchi had been our domestic assistant since my childhood days. She had 10 children. Their infantile illness forced her to take them to doctors and hospitals regularly.

This frequent visit to the doctor prompted neighbours to consult Kunchi when their kids fell ill, apparently to save the doctor’s fee.

Our maid functioned like a quack, reeling out names of the medicines she knew. My neighbours hardly realised being miserly in health matters would only cause more danger.

Talking of miserliness, some old village folks used to be stingy to the extent of absurdity. Once, two old pals were talking at night in a room. One of them, the house owner, felt no need for light while they talked and switched off the light.

After the conversation was over he switched on the light only to see with surprise the other one was sitting half naked.

“Why did you remove your clothing,” the first one enquired. The second replied: “As you said rightly that there is no need of light while talking in the dark; I thought why clothes when we won’t be able to see each other?!”