Just Another Day:

The din persists throughout the day, from the crack of dawn till well into the night. People, cars, autos and even trucks….going and coming non-stop like an ever shifting kaleidoscope. The old man drags his basket of bananas to a particular spot right outside the small temple. He insists on giving everybody a plastic bag. Couple of hours later, he’s gone unlike the middle aged woman sitting next to him, selling spices and what appear to be seeds in various containers spread around her.

A man comes with his cart, full of garlic and stands at a vantage point at the corner of a narrow lane. Not much sales today and in a few hours his place is empty….soon taken over by another cart full of colourful plastic toys. Suddenly he’s surrounded by eager mothers in ‘nighties’ rummaging through the cart. A couple of boys are talking and laughing at the ‘Xerox’ centre nearby comfortable in the chaos around.

The clouds suddenly let go and the strong winds make the raindrops fall at a thirty degree angle. The click of the umbrellas opening sound like somebody’s checking his drum-sticks before hitting the drums. Everybody’s umbrella is slanted at the same angle to shield themselves from the oncoming rain.

The day slows down to evening, and the shift in the wind direction unfurls the MNS flag which had wound itself around the flagpole in the daytime. The approaching night envelops everything in its darkness, cloaking all real life details in its mysterious fold. In the distance the twinkling lights of the airport bursts through, shimmering in the cold wetness around. An airplane slowly comes to a halt, its taillight still blinking red. A different world leaps out from that horizon, drawing you like a magnet….to the world of gloss, wealth, distant lands, important meetings and eagerly waiting families.

The lilting sound of a wind-chime floats out from somewhere. You can hear the wind blow. Then all is quiet.

City Traits:

After almost two years, I have finally mastered the art of that imperceptible nod that everybody uses here to say a yes or a no. A quick nod by the autowallah or the taxi driver tells you whether you should get in or not. As a new comer I could barely notice the nod leave alone understand its meaning, asking them twice and staring at their faces to get an audible yes or no. The same nod is used by the people travelling on a local, to indicate whether she/he would be getting off at the next station or not. I smiled to myself the other day, when I caught myself nodding to a fellow passenger without even looking her way.

A year back, while trying desperately to hail a taxi after work, I was given a ride home by a stranger who was also waiting for a cab and who got it before I did. At first I was surprised, then scared and then strangely touched by the gesture. Later noticing around, I realized it was not too big a deal here. Now-a-days, I share my auto with strangers going the same direction and they do the same for me.

The third thing I have mastered, is the art of finding my space in a crowded train compartment without stepping over other people, hitting them with my bag or getting in their way. Nobody tells you these codes of conduct…(of how to stand/sit so that your feet are not sticking out, how to hold your purse so that it doesn’t poke the other person)….you watch the people around you and you just get to know.

And in this entire crowded milieu, what I love to do is to eavesdrop on other people’s phone conversations…..to imagine their lives and match their faces and looks to their voices and their stories.

Life and Living:

Sometimes I wonder where this city is headed to. In the night, with a glittering city-line one can be fooled to believe that it resembles Manhattan. Listen carefully and you can hear the city groan and creak under the strain. I look at all those tall buildings sprouting like mushrooms everywhere, but there is not a single one where we can stay.

I thought we had a decent budget for getting a good house on rent. As it turned out we were almost laughed at by the brokers. Add to it the fact that we are ‘bachelors’ and hence most areas were automatically out of our reach. We were taken to areas where you will never go even in your dream, to buildings besides huge stinking nalas full of mosquitoes and to buildings where all the wires were hanging out ready to kill somebody. We saw apartments where the loo stank, where there was no natural light, where the vibes were so negative that it sent shivers down our spine. And then we were taken to a nice house in a good locality and told in a harsh voice….that its available only if we guarantee that there would be no ‘boys’ coming.

It was humiliating and depressing. Depressing because there are people and families who stay in all these buildings and houses for years….cramped and dirty. Humiliating because the married neighbors feel it’s important to warn the brokers (who in turn will warn us) that we are stepping into a ‘family’ area.

I wonder exactly what is the cost of dignified living in this city…..probably too much. There are many who can afford as one can see from the mushrooming skyscrapers but for the rest of us it’s far too big a compromise.

I Stand Corrected:

C said that the most beautiful view in the world is to see the snow peaks on a full moon day. The range turns absolutely blue and sparkles in the silvery light. I was jealous of C. This was his first visit to the mountains, yet he has seen this fantastic sight. I, on the other hand have been to the Himalayas so many times but never ever seen such a sight. Even on this visit to Kumaon, the summer haze hid the snow range on the full moon day. I still have so much to see and experience.

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In my last post I said that villagers are so simple and happily ignorant. Here in the villages of Kumaon I saw a different sight. With the help of an organization – Chirag - who have 209 villages under their wing for conservation through community development, they have come a long way. And all the change have been understood, led and implemented by women. Its not that the organization deliberately chose to empower the women……but it’s a big fact that men are less prone to gaining positive knowledge and more prone to resistance and destruction. With proper guidance, the women of the villages are now involved directly into all areas of work….from forestry, rain water harvesting, education, livelihood issues, self help group, micro-financing, agricultural marketing etc.

One woman of the Van Panchyat Committee (Forestry) admitted that if given to the men folks they would cut down all trees for easy money. She and a female member from each house takes turn to guard the forest, plant trees and collect fodder and dry twigs. I looked at the mountain side….it was lush green and vibrant.

I remembered Dan Brown’s DaVinci Code. Our ancestors were right. There’s immense power in the feminine.

And I was grossly wrong in my thinking. Villagers are ignorant but you can change their mindset by giving them right education and guidance. Whereas its just the opposite for city folks. They are educated, yet its so difficult to change their mindset. Tell a villager why it’s unwise to use plastic and they will carry one plastic bag for months. Tell a city folk that it’s unwise to use plastic…and they will insist on taking back 3 plastic bags instead of 1 every time they shop. They are not bothered because they wouldn’t give up their luxurious life or mad rush for money for anything in this world. Even if it means giving up Earth.

And its when we actually reach down to their level and try to understand, we see that in reality its us and not them, who have no clue.

World Apart:

Recently I got a chance to volunteer for an organization dealing with wildlife conservation and community development. One of their ways to gain trust of the villagers is to conduct medical camps in villages inside and outside the forest area. Medical camps in villages within the forest are exciting. Not only you get to experience the forest at close quarters but also see the effects of human life on the ecology directly. I was that way very unlucky. My camps were in villages outside the forest area.

Though I didn’t get to experience the forest, I did get a chance to get close to the villagers. These villages were in prime tourism locality…..and so one would think full of ‘jobs’ potential. But strangely nobody wanted to work in the resorts. They were happy with small amount of work and small amount of money….and loads of free time for themselves. Very few wanted to learn more about the world…..to open their mind. I had infact long believed that they understood nature and respected it more than us. So imagine my surprise when I learnt that they did not even know the difference between a cobra and a rat snake. And because they had all grown up with the forest in their backyards….they were simply not interested to know more.

The scary part of it is the difficulty of educating them about the need for conservation and importance of wildlife. It’s like telling them to protect something which they have abundance of and hence don’t need, and which we outsiders are going all out to destroy by logging and poaching (for our city needs).

The charming part is their satisfaction in small things and small quantities. And their innocence. (No wonder our politicians love them so!). I was caught between wanting to shake them off their inertia and lethargy and tell them about the world beyond, and wanting to let them be. Exactly where can the cut off be….I do not know.
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Back in town, I went for a night out to one of the most expensive ‘discs’ with my friends. Music boomed, liquor flowed and so did the smell of wealth – perfume, dresses, accessories. As far as I am concerned, music sucked…even if it means it’s played out by a well-known dj and it’s the favourite haunt of the city’s social circle. Hours of trance music and remixes of bad bollywood songs and shimmering disco lights started doing funny things to my mind. I got increasingly claustrophobic. I looked around at the branded clothes, high stilettos, short skirts, swaying arms and perspiring bodies. People really do spend so much money every week….for this? Either I am seriously getting old or the world has really gone drastically wrong.

Parallel:

There is a big park just a stone’s throw away from my apartment. Parks are an anomaly here…and big parks, a miracle. So it’s not a big surprise that it’s always teeming with people, morning noon or night. I am not a morning person when I am in the city…its like waking up to chaos. I like to see the chaos settling down to silence….so I like walking in the night here. Though there are still a lot of people than I would like, I don’t mind them that much. I can easily melt into the ambience, sit alone and not get bothered.

The park is round and surrounded by tall buildings all around. When you look up, you see this tiny patch of space that is the sky. Sometimes I think that’s what a frog would see looking up from the well. Sometimes I feel I am in a toy land – those tiny tall buildings covered by a glass hemisphere type of a toy – somebody shakes it and you get snowflakes.

I have not been able to shake off this surreal toy-land feeling in the past 2 years. I don’t remember seeing stars, or floating clouds or getting caught in a sudden breeze which cools your senses. There are fleeting glimpses of the moon…while traveling on a train; at the seaface the horizons are mostly smoggy to see any clouds. Now I know why most people of this city can’t live anywhere else. It’s this constant warm, fuzzy, un-real feeling that one grew up with. It’s difficult to get rid of when you are so used to it. There’s nothing to make you feel restless – no sparkling moon with the smell of approaching winter, no bright mornings with parrots chirping, no sudden drizzle after a hot muggy day. The only change in this constant exterior happens when the rain lashes down for days…then there is a sudden burst of exhilaration and energy engulfing everybody in its fold. Because that’s the only reality in the year which seeps into you and make you feel real, alive.

They say Bombay grows on you. And I will agree with that completely. Living here is like finding your own snuggly spot in a huge non-interfering joint family. When I ask people where they think I come from, they all say the same. That I am definitely not a Bombaiyya and that they have no clue which city I belong to. I have no ‘ite’ attached to me. I can belong to any and every city.
And that’s how I want it to stay.

The Commi Caper:

It felt like a typical bollywood story. Twins separated at birth. Both looked the same, believed in the same ideologies, ate the same things. The only difference was that while one liked coconut, the other had taken to mustard. And of course, their outlook on women. Also like a typical story, one had become rich, while the other struggles to keep the head above the water.

Just remove a few coconut trees from around the village ponds and add in more bamboo shrubs and the villages of Kerala and Bengal would look the same too.

The stark difference now though is the presence of colour in Kerala and the sheer lack of it in Bengal. Most of the old style houses have been razed and ponds filled up to build the most colourful concrete houses I have ever come across in my life. From deep orange, magenta, bright yellow to 3 shades brighter than parrot green….I was jumping like I found new treasure each time I encountered a new colour. This bright colouring is prevalent everywhere…..from temples, saaris, and ropes, to wall paintings-advertising (which mostly are of jewelers and builders), boats and even butterflies (I saw one gorgeous black and red butterfly in one of the villages)

It might not come across as a big surprise for many people, but I didn’t know how to react to the fact that there are no empty stretches in Kerala. One village seamlessly merges with the next throughout the entire coast. Although in a different place I would have found this claustrophobic, but here the greenery and the hundreds of waterways seemed to cover up everything….giving you an illusion of living in a thick dense tropical forest.

What I loved the most was observing the women there. For a fully literate matriarchal state, the women are surprisingly coy….even the news-reader in a business suit was soft-spoken…almost apologetic. Kochi (with its numerous food-joints misguidingly called ‘barkery’, where they sold anything from sweets to beef chilliy) however was a bit different, I felt. The current young generation was quite open…wore western dresses and sat freely with each other. This, I found only in the city-centre….the moment you entered the residential areas…they were clad in salwar-kurta with properly oiled and braided hair and carrying umbrellas. My friend and I stuck out like sore thumbs….stared up and down so blatantly that after some time we stopped getting bothered. I, in my travelers’ attire of pajama, t-shirt and dupatta came across as a foreigner….so much so that in one local temple a priest refused to give me flowers or a tika on my forehead!

It’s a very strange concoction of a state – very rich and expensive where you cannot shout
at an auto or honk at them ‘cause they are equal and have the same right to the road as you do. Even the maid will refuse to take tea if you serve her in a different cup than yours. Yet despite all this surface equality, there lacks the basic equality between a guy and a girl. Their traditional role, attire and looks are etched strongly in people’s mind….any different and one gets so stared at that its better to look like a homogenous mass than be different. To the point of living a stifled life, I feel. One thing I found quite commendable is the fact that despite so much external influences through tourism, they have managed to retain their traditions aggressively.

I just wish I had come here earlier and discovered niches and pockets which tourism has not taken over yet.

A short story:

The music had lain there for years, forgotten. Now she looked at it trying to remember why she had not listened to it in so many years. She switched it on. The tunes floated inside her brain, engulfing her in its haunting warmth….traversing down every cell in her body. And then it reached her heart.

It felt like she was struck by a hammer. She doubled over; her arms going around herself instinctively….trying to brace herself from the vacuum that was threatening to pull her in. She had thought she had come a long way…choosing to be where she was. She had stopped her search, forgiven, forgotten.

A blankness surrounded her now. And darkness. Tears poured down un-sensed and unchecked. Panic. She looked up at the darkness, reaching out for somebody….something. But there was nobody, nothing.

Only emptiness. The music had stopped

Another short story:

She didn’t know her father, only her mother and her two brothers. They lived in poverty. Her mother was her only connect to the world. So it wasn’t really a mystery that the two brothers left her when their mother died. She was only 12 and all alone.

She survived growing up to be young woman. Though she was plain looking, she could have turned head had she grown up in a richer environment. Now she wore a colourless dirty peasant dress and tied a scarf around her head…roaming around the market place with her empty cart trying to figure out her next meal. People around her were happy, laughing, talking. She felt like a ghost. Nobody noticed her, talked to her.

She grew older….yet without any connect with the world or its people. She never cried at her fate accepting what was given to her. Desolate and empty.

Now she suddenly remembered and felt the desolation and emptiness after all these years. And finally she cried. Cried at her fate and her disconnect with her world or its people.

At last she knew.

A breather:

From the unpredictability of this city and life itself.

A little road trip to a forest, a hill station, to a bit of history and finally to a golden beach.

We had initially planned to go by train but the 26-11 incident changed all that. So we decided to brave a 14hrs drive to Dandeli in the north of Karnataka. And it was this decision that made the trip such a memorable one.

Taking only two breaks – one at Mcdonalds (yuck!) at 8 and another at a tapri chai joint near Ramnagar at 3 in the morning (where we finished all the eggs and bread he had) – we reached Dandeli at 6 when the sky was just getting lighter. Kali Resort, where we stayed was a disappointment for me because it’s at the edge of civilization and the river there smelt of chemicals. Throughout the night we could hear the sound of the huge machineries of the paper mill across the river. One city bred friend thought it was the sound of the river!

Dandeli, a part of a 5000sqkm forest which stretches upto Kerala, is absolutely beautiful….filled in parts with huge bamboo thickets and really tall trees (teaks and rosewood included). Thankfully the state government is aware and follows stringent rules. Apart from tigers and elephants, this area is home to the gorgeous Black Panther and thousands of exotic birds. What I loved about this forest is that it’s filled with fireflies. When the sky turns a dark blue, the bamboo thickets and shrubs come alive with these sparkling glows….thousands of them. It’s such a magical sight!

One day, a horde of some 40 girls and guys came to the resort for a rafting trip. They turned the resort into a mela-ground, shattering everybody’s peace and creating chaos. No respect for nature or the wildlife….just wanting to have Loud Fun. There’s hardly any ecology left…I wonder whether the next generation will ever learn?

The boys in our group had to leave early and since the three of us girls had a few more days of holiday left, we decided to go ahead and explore on our own….(thanks to our plan of taking the car instead of the train). So we moved on to Panhala for a day, took God’s blessing at the Mahalaxmi temple at Kolhapur and zoomed onwards to Ganapatiphule…reaching just as the sun had turned orange in the sky.

We spent one whole blissful day on the golden shell filled beach…lying down as the waves crashed over us, collecting shells and live crabs, making sand castles, skinny dipping and walking on the endless uninhabited beach.

We set off back home just as the sun was setting, splashing the sky with brilliant pink and grey clouds……cursing our need to earn money and making plans for another longer road trip.

Reasons:

It was a gentle day. The train whizzed past. A piece of paper caught the gust and rose high up in the air waltzing to its own tune.

The sun, low on the horizon peeped thorough the palm leaf and turned my living room golden. The leaf swayed with the wind and the sun danced on the wall. A stray ray caught my lashes and the world got speckled with gold dust.

The warmth…. played hide and seek with me. Now here now gone. It’s not mine…..but I want a few drops from it. Like an elixir……revival till another day……

Do I matter?

Something has snapped. Not just in me, but my friends, neighbors, the whole of Mumbai…and perhaps the whole of the country. Everybody knows that this time, it was different…..very very different. Stretched too far, even an elastic loses its resilience…..we are human beings after all. This time, we know that we Never were and we Never will be safe. That our leaders have bled the nation and sold fellow countrymen. That they never cared. That they have betrayed us.

Though this is over, we don’t feel relieved.
We can’t. Not yet.

Maybe:

There’s a crow which lives on the tree just outside my living room window. He knows he’s different. Because I often find him spending time clearing his throat, making strange guttural sounds and then cawing in his own peculiar manner. He sounds like a teenager whose voice is just breaking. He keeps cawing continuously trying to sound normal like the other city crows. I feel bad for him….. ‘cause he sounds desperate in his effort to mingle with the others, sound like them….and not stand out from the homogenous mass. I wish I could tell him that he’s normal because he sounds like the crows in the Himalayas….only that he’s in the wrong place.

I wish I could tell him that I love his voice because he’s different….that it reminds me of my haven…..which now seems some light years away….
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More than three decades, and now it seems like a lifetime. A phase where things do not bother me like the way it used to before. Things are far from satisfactory but I feel calm.
There’s still lot to be done, lot to learn and I think I can roughly chalk out my path ahead. But what refuses to let go of me is this feeling since my childhood….this strange vague sense of longing…of searching for something which is perhaps not there. Usually the feeling is suppressed and lost in the daily grind…so much so that I don’t even remember it. It’s only when I sit by the sea looking at the sky turn orange and then purple that it boils over. Everything around me turns unreal and then all I want to do is run and escape….to some real parallel universe…..

Ghayal Nagar:

An apt sign which I saw behind a truck one night. Wounded city. That’s what I would call Bombay now. Infact for that matter, most cities in India now. Wounded time and time again. Survive, rebuild and then get wounded again. Sometimes I wonder, how long till one gives up and lay waste.

I once took a local at 6 in the evening. I looked at the watch and panicked. Wasn’t this the time when the train blasts had happened.

This time in Delhi, I hesitated before going to Lajpat Nagar to shop on a Sunday at 5 in the evening.

This is what life has finally come to….calculating time and place….wondering what is next.

If not this, then it’s a mad rush to accumulate all things material. You have a house, but you want another house. If not in Mumbai, then in Pune. You’ve got an Alto, but its time for a Chevrolet. A budget of Rs 1 crore for a house is no big a deal anymore. When I turned around and exclaimed that it’s an obnoxious amount, people around looked at me strangely. Watches, Clothes, iPhones, ipods, Macs…..you name it and they all have it. And still wish for more. There’s a mad rush all around you. Mad. Mad. Rush.

The more people crave for these, the more they repel me. Why do you exactly need them? And why a house in these congested, claustrophobic cities and fill them up with the latest bar from those expensive furniture malls?

Or is it just a way to keep away from the reality? That they are all wounded. Wounded souls in wounded cities…….And that’s its okay to be.

Into the Wild – 2:

http://sunsettrails.blogspot.com/2007_02_01_archive.html (hyperlink not working)

I saw the movie by Sean Penn a few months back – out of curiosity. Good effort because he did manage to capture almost all details of the book. But can anyone really explain in just an hour and a half exactly what Chris McCandless was all about…..his passion, his beliefs, his soul?

Hence I find it strange when I hear people say that they were affected by the movie. Affected by the story of his life or affected by what he believed in? No one can understand until one has felt even remotely what he yearned for from life – and that is Freedom.

The only thing which I felt came close to Chris McCandless is this song by Eddie Vedder – Society.

It's a mystery to me

We have a greed

With which we have agreed

You think you have to want

Mthan you need

Until you have it all you won't be free

Society, you're a crazy breed

I hope you're not lonely without me
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I have completed a year now in Mumbai and I can say with conviction what the others have always said….that the Monsoon is The best season here.

Throughout these months I was worried sick of getting stuck at some forlorn place because of heavy rains and not manage to reach anywhere. Even on the day when a similar event as that of 26th July threatened to occur, I could not help but admire the lashing rain and wind which almost blew the autos off the roads. But I did realize something - fear psychosis that occurs as a result of destruction by nature, is far greater than any other created by man.

Also throughout these months, I did not miss the sun at all. I loved to see the grey sheets of rain in the morning turn white at night. Wind which sprayed the sea onto the city and rain laden gusts which drenched you despite the tightly wrapped wind cheater. Wet floaters, spotting the black layers of cloud rushing towards you and the mad scramble to get the cover down on both side of the auto before it came gushing down. Everything turned clean and misty…even the Powai Lake which looked so surreal when the clouds hid the hideous buildings all around it.

I obviously did not miss any opportunity to step out of the city on the weekends….driving with friends through the Ghats….. sooo green that it hurt my eyes. I have never seen this colour of green anywhere else in all my life. Vibrant, pulsating with life, purely fluorescent. It’s difficult to stare away from the greens so abundant all around and not to stop and run and dance around in the meadows.

After those few escapes out of the city, I’m finding it difficult to do anything city-like. No pubs, no coffee shops, no shopping in malls. No closed spaces. Life is not this.

Just wide open green and grey spaces. And fleeting clouds. That surely is Life.

In search:

It wasn’t my illusion
The Oasis
I saw it, I felt it
I surrendered my weary soul
It showed me the reason
And my Haven

I wanted to touch it
The Oasis
I did touch it
But a blinding mist, so thick
It permeated through my skin
To the very soul
I lost my dreams and my reason
I lost my truth and also my Haven

I lost my path
Ahead or behind
And in losing all, maybe I’ll find
A life that can finally be mine

(Ad) Venturing Out:

Like any other non-Mumbaiyya, I am scared of the locals. For almost a year, I resisted vehemently to any suggestions of trying it out even once. So in the strange way that life operates, I am thrown in a situation where I am forced to travel partially by the locals. And strangely still I am kind of warming up to it.

I have learnt which trains to take in order to avoid that mad rush; how to figure out whether it’s a 12 coach or a 9 coach train and stand according to it; just how fast to run in order to reach the first class compartment on time; and how to stand near the door without inconveniencing the mass of women getting in or getting out.

I know now that when one says ‘empty’ it means that you’ll eventually get a place to sit, when its ‘comfortable’ it means you can stand without being jostled.

Its like an assault to your senses when you enter a station…all you see is a moving sea of faces and bodies. But look around and you pick up stories.

Like the woman sitting in front of me one day. She was talking gently on the phone when my feet accidentally touched her feet. She threw me such a venomous look that it felt like a physical blow. So much stress, so much aggression and so much bitterness….and I’m sure she’s not even aware of it.

Like the two blind girls who came and stood at the correct place meant for them – the compartment for the handicapped. They were confident and happy – talking non-stop. In a place where it’s a daily struggle for everybody, they stood out like an island of happiness.

Like the girl who didn’t know where she was because she was fighting with her boyfriend on the phone. I tried hard not to hear what she was saying but I did hear her say a couple of times – “if you don’t take care of me…you’ll lose me”. She was young and her words made me think how much she has to learn.

I have realized that one has to stay aloof from all these stories that are abound lest you get sucked in its vortex everyday. So I avoid the peak traffic times and I stay miles away from the second class compartment. I love to stand near the door and feel the wind and the raindrops on my face when the ‘fast’ train speeds past the stations.

I don’t want to become a part of that world.
Or maybe I have already become just another story.

Monsoon Limited:

However little I have experienced of it, the monsoons is a completely different way-of-life here. With the heavy pre-monsoon rains, there was a flurry of activity all around. Everybody including me ran to buy the rain essentials – umbrella, wind cheater coz your umbrella would be blown off by the wind and floaters so that you can walk without any worry. There was an easy camaraderie among people….all seemed bonded by one basic element – the rains. What I find amusing is that heavy or light; the rains don’t seem to affect any aspect of life here. The swarms of people walking on the roads everyday never reduce. They walk as fast and purposefully as they walk everyday – completely nonchalant about the sheets of water pouring down all around. The only difference is that the trousers are rolled up and the bags held a little closer under the umbrella. But I added a pair of extra clothes, shoes, biscuits and water bottle in my everyday carry bag.

With the first downpour, I rushed to my favorite place in the city – the sea. I sat under one umbrella with my friend N and watched the grey sea froth and fume. It was a beautiful sight – a raging sea under an ever darkening sky and sheets of falling rain blowing into your face. I love the sea when it’s like this – in its true form. The calm sea always agitates me – it’s like most people around you – a different exterior to give a false sense of well being, alluring you and then pulling you down in its murky depths. The angry sea is the reality – there’s no temptation….only those who can float on its surface can really belong.

Then one day through my bedroom window, the monsoon showed me the actual reality that is our society. I saw couple come out of their house in the rain. They were under one umbrella and trying to stop an auto. The woman clad in a sari was holding the umbrella making sure that the husband (am assuming) didn’t get wet. She was only three-fourth inside while the man was completely under cover with this shirt sleeves and pants rolled up. An auto stopped. The man got in first followed by the woman. I kept wondering – shouldn’t all this be the other way around?

But now the green hills, the wet roads and the misty climes beckon. That would actually be the real monsoon experience.

Hmmm.....

My friend R’s philosophies - contd:

There are some things money can buy; others things are obviously not worth it.

On hindsight, if yesterday is always better than today, are we then headed for a grand catastrophe?

Seen, Read or Heard somewhere:

Life – Dream = Job

There is pleasure sure...
In being mad, which none but madmen know.

Just remember. If this world didn’t suck, we would have all fallen off by now.

Breaks:

I don’t look forward to the future. I am comfortable with the present. But it’s the past that makes me stay grounded. A quick break back to Delhi helped me reign in the directionless thoughts and clear a few cobwebs from my mind. It’s that time of the year when the brilliant orange gulmohars starts fading and the sunny yellow alamtas brighten up the roads. The heat during the day was stifling but the nights and morning saw a spate of thundershowers. A few easy hours spend with friends at places where I had left a thousand memories; a quick shopping trip for friends back here in this city and a couple of days spend with my sister and parents…..all simply took away the fatigue that was slowly seeping in.

I hate the fact though, that it started pouring in the city just a few hours after I left it.
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I went with D and a few city-sleekers and first timers for a moonlight beach hike. We started the walk at the dead of the night through a completely empty stretch of beach, tree-lined road and a quaint Portuguese style village. The air was muggy with just a whiff of breeze here and there. But the almost full moon that shone on the water was utterly surreal and illusionary.

When we reached our camping point after 4 hours, everybody in the team immediately went off sleep. I and D went behind some rocks to change and when we came out, we saw the most spectacular sight ever. The silver moon had now turned golden and huge as it lay very low on the horizon. It blinded us with its light and I felt as if I was in a strange planet in a far away galaxy. I looked at the sleeping figures on the beach and wondered how anybody could go off to sleep on such a beautiful night. I stayed awake looking at the stars, the dark clouds rolling in and out, the sky lightening and the stars fading, the lone villager going past in his bullock cart….feeling a strange sense of awe, loneliness, contentment and detachment all jumbled together.

When the first rays of the sun hit the hill behind us, I drifted off to an easy sleep.
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This is going to be my first monsoon in this city. I am dreading the four months of no sun shine, fungus, water clogging and stinking taxis. But I am waiting eagerly for those four months of rain, brilliantly green hillsides, wet roads leading to stormy sea sides, sitting by the worli sea-face when the first dark clouds roll in, feel the sea spray on your face when it dashes against the wall at marine drive while getting drenched in the rain.

This will be my first real, actual Indian monsoon. And I am waiting.

Mumbai Chronicles: Contd.

It’s almost nine months now….and I’m finally warming up to Bombay and living on my own. Random people still ask me the same question….which is better, Delhi or Bombay….and I still give them a clichéd answer about traffic and infrastructure and people and all that blah.

Over the months, my reactions to this city have mellowed. I have stopped comparing everything to what it’s like in Delhi. The apartment which seemed tiny when I shifted here now seems luxurious in comparison to flats in the suburbs. I still crib about traffic but now I have found many lanes and by-lanes leading away from the traffic. I know where to go in order to avoid rigged autos or taxis. I know the taxi chart by heart. I can even give directions to a Bombay-wallah. I know shops which sell original perfume at half the price, salons which gives fantastic head massages, cute lingerie stores, melt-in-the-mouth home made ice-cream parlours, markets for buying good yet cheap curtains and bedcovers, yummy muslim food joints. Despite what other people say, I still like Haji ali’s strawberry and cream than the Bachelors’. I know how much time it takes to reach Town at 5 and at 7 in the evening. I have learnt to take a taxi or auto ride home at 1 in the night without sitting on the edge of the seat all the way. I like watching canoodling couples in the back seat of the taxis. I have realized that Bombay gives you lot of personal space while Delhi gives you only physical space. I like the vastness of the sea and the fact that I can sit alone for hours without being bothered. I have found that this city is full of evasive melodious koyals. But mostly I like the attitude of the guys here….who unlike Delhites will not think that you are looking for sex if you touch them when you speak.

But what I yearn for the most is the closeness to the Himalayas. I have stepped out of the city a few times but nowhere have I got the high of the clean fresh air of the mountains. I love the fact that I know the mountains like my own backyard and that most Bombay-wallahs don’t. Somehow I feel that they are immensely unlucky that they have never known the mountains. How else can I explain what it feels like to take a bus in the night and wake up to a crystal clear sky and pine scented air; what it feels like when the cold mountain wind tousles your hair and your skin begs to feel the warm glow of the sun? To look at the millions of stars in the cold night sky and feel the warmth of the silence around you. To go on those long walk with friends without feeling the need to speak or those crazy laughter sessions over a nightcap, that echoes throughout the little town. How can I explain that standing there facing the snow-peaks, you feel alive like you have never felt in the city; that it’s the only place where you can be you.

Delhi will always remain one-up for me in this regard. Bombay still has a long way to go. One day when it makes me pine for the freedom of the sea….then I’ll completely belong.