BY MIHIR SRIVASTAVA
A small town boy from Orissa had big plans. Jubanashwa Mishra, was bored with his secured life. He wanted some action, perhaps, exploration, to figure out what was nagging him and why. He was seeking answers for an existential dilemma: “why do we seek the security of a conventional job?” And miss out on so much fun.
He set out to do the improbable. He undertook a self exploratory journey: did 28 jobs in 28 weeks in 28 different states of India at the age of 28 years. It took him 7 months.
He was true to his calling. The exploratory zeal by way of travelling is in his genes, but this was not a pilgrimage.
By his mid twenties, he was making decent money working for an IT firm. That wasn’t particularly satisfying to him. He was not ready to compromise with his dream for the security of a conventional job. Mishra undertook this journey when his parents threatened to tie a nuptial knot.
He wants to make informed decisions. The blind date with destiny is not an appealing idea for him. He wanted to experiment with experiences before he does the obvious, get married and have children. He was toying with the idea for a couple of years, it gained strength with time. Marriage, that felt like a threat, as he was not ready for it yet, got him going.
He stopped all communication with parents in the next couple of months and researched, planned organised his 28 jobs in 28 different parts of the country. This was not easy, but where there's will there's a way. Sean Aiken, who did 52 jobs in 52 weeks in Canada, needless to add, was an inspiration.
"A journey of self delivery fuelled by the desire to live our dreams," is how he puts it.
The difficult part was to plan a route and then to arrange finances for this rather improbable idea. Crowdfunding came to his rescue, also convincing prospective employers to hire him for just a week was bit of a challenge.
Mishra gave himself some extra time between jobs to acclimatise to these rather radical change of jobs, which was happening far too often.
He undertook a 25,000 kilometre journey to do 28 jobs spread across India. The modes of transport to reach his various work places were equally varied: train, bus, share taxi, plane, tram, auto-rickshaw, bike, cab, boat, raft, and on foot.
He cleaned hillsides in Dharamshala, cremated bodies on the ghats of Varanasi, sold condoms in Bihar, managed a hotel in Udaipur, sold peanuts in the Marina beach of Chennai, helped a caregiver looking after HIV positive in Shillong, did a river rafting trip in Chenab river, assisted a tattoo artist in Goa and a motorbike mechanic in Aaizwal–to list a few.
In the process, he had memorable encounters varied kind of people with all kinds of motivations like an Aghori sadhus, Naxal drug dealers, fixers, aged hippies amongst others that include a brief reunion with his first love.
This was a personal revolution for Mishra who hails from the discreet city of Sonepur–the Varanasi of the East–in Orissa. He spent a good part of his childhood “on the river Mahanadi” --a good swimmer. “In water, none of my friends could beat me,” he says. He was reasonably good in studies, though introduction to the English language happened late in his life, and engineering chose him for higher studies. It was a “joyful association” as he puts it, and one of the reasons was, he fell in love with a teacher.
He gained certain valuable insights. Like you find people well informed in the remotest part of the country. A storyteller makes the journey smooth. He himself is one. You never know which part of the country you may feel at home. He made many homes. As James Baldwin famously wrote in his book Giovanni's Room, “Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.” Further, Bollywood songs are integral part of every Indian. And last not the least, there is no point felling proud of reaching a remote place with tents, expensive cameras and bikes-the civilisation that still exists there goes back a thousand years or more.
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