“Tea?” The Professor asked Prof. Devika Sharma, as he saw her entering in the faculty room.
“Yeah, sure. Thanks!” She replied promptly with a gentle smile and kept her belongings on the table before pulling out a chair and seating herself. Her computer was flashing a wallpaper with a quote on sustainability. She glanced at it and then looked at the Professor to say something.
“Looks like you had a tiring day?” He asked her, waiting near the vending machine, for a second cup to be filled and before she could say something,
“Yes, but it was interesting too.” Prof. Devika replied with a joyous smile.
“I talked about Sustainability and Green Design today. You know what? I was shocked…. the students hardly knew anything about it, not even about any Architects who practice Sustainability or any building….” Prof. Devika continued and took her first sip of the tea. By now he also sat, carefully placed a book mark in the book he was reading and closed it. A signal that he was all ears.
The institute had recently reopened after summer vacations. In most of the parts of the country these were like extended summers with no sign of rains, and high humidity.
“And we all know how important the subject is today. We are experiencing drastic climate changes, global warming, but these students, they seem to be very casual about it.” Said Prof. Devika. She was an authority on the subject, or at least she thought so, and, with the increasing demand and popularity of the subject she too was gaining a good recognition in the institute and among her network.
“Absolutely. Students must have enjoyed your talk and gained a lot.” He hinted for Prof. Devika to continue her talk.
“Yes. In fact, many students came to me and asked for more information and some names of Architects and buildings that they could study.” Prof. Devika replied almost instantly.
For the next ten minutes Prof. Devika held forth her talk on Sustainability, her discourse not only included the content, but the presentation skills also. Prof. Devika almost sounded like a God on the subject, ‘sustainability’.
He listened to her patiently throughout but kept waiting for a reasonably good pause…
“Madam, I am sorry, I will have to leave, have a lecture with second year.” He didn’t let go the opportunity and filled the pause as soon as as it appeared. “We will discuss this later, hope you don’t mind?” He smiled and got up from his chair to leave the room after shutting down his computer and picking up the book, he was reading.
“Yeah, sure. Even I have a ‘part II’ of same lecture in some time.” Prof. Devika smiled and gulped the last sip of tea.
She sat there for some time, reading a document on Sustainability on her computer, preparing for her forthcoming lecture with same students. She glanced at her watch and hurriedly closed the document, picked up her belongings and proceeded towards classroom.
Left behind in the empty room, were the tube lights competing fiercely with the broad day light of summer, the squeaking sounds of fans in complete sync with the sound of Air Conditioner and blinking green and red lights of the CPU, and, HER COMPUTER, which sat silently on the table, flaunting a quote by Hervé Kempf
“Consume less; share better.”