Till Then

I think (and I seem to be doing a lot of it these days) this blog needs to be abandoned. That really is quite a harsh word- "Abandoned". The associated feelings are definitely not quite as deep.

Its been a little under a year since I began blogging, and while Juley has been my best till date, I really enjoyed the time I had at Feeling Monsoon. But going over my recent posts on Smokerings, I realize that I am not really the kind of person this blog depicts. Fifty five posts later, I think increasingly my blog reads like that of an armchair activist (which I am not), a hardcore cribber (which again negative) and finally, at times, a lonely, lost, heartbroken individual (which is so not true). Writing the way I do lately doesn't make me happy as I did at Feeling Monsoon. And why else would I write if not to feel happy? I think I would be happier writing things that I feel good writing about. Being the person I think I am- genuinely.

So I am moving on; and my last post on this page is along those thoughts and similarly slightly dark.

Yesterday at the end of a cab ride, the driver, a boy of about 18 (funny how I refer to people that age as boys and girls now) pulled out the fare chart and pointed to a number, mumbling something incoherently. While we seemed to agree upon the amount payable I couldn’t quite agree to what he seemed to be saying. I offered what I felt was right, and he happily pocketed it. I was in a hurry and slightly irritable since I had to give him directions for a short and regular ride from my office to Bombay Central. I stepped out, but in spite of the immense hurry that I had been in, I couldn’t resist the temptation to ask him in Hindi where he was from:

T.O.: Kahan se ho bhaiyya?
C.D. (Cab Driver): Chembur
T.O.: Hindi nahin ataa? Kyun?
C.D.(giving a very sad look): Marathi…
(Drives away)

Life makes people move for a livelihood or marriage, or just change. I have moved all over the country- in search of work and an education. My sister has done so too. RV moved to Dubai for work and then to Jersey City, marriage. People move all the time, willingly unwillingly. Such is life. Thus far I have moved at will, and enjoyed each move, but each move comes at a certain personal loss. Loss of friends, of family, but for the likes of me for whom most change is welcome I think the benefits of the experience far outweighs the inconveniences.

However, even for me, every time I move into a new city, a new house or in the past a cubby-hole hostel room, and shut the door to the world outside, and as the reality sinks in I do feel a certain hollow, a churning of my insides, and let out a deep sigh, which is often where, thankfully, the emotional trouble ends and the activity of settling down takes over. I often wonder what is it that happens when people move against their will. How do they reconcile to it? The loss, the anguish, the physical effort, and sometimes, the guilt of it.

For instance this cabbie, who has clearly been driven to this city from his village, not speaking the language, with little money to buy things which can ease the pain of relocation. Without love or loved ones. I guess for them it is only hope, only the promise of a better tomorrow, or the feeling of having their back against the wall in a place they called home, a feeling of there being no other choice, which is there to distract from the pain of moving. In his case the general bewilderment would be stronger still, knowing that he is in a city inhabited by movers-on, and a city which was supposed to speak his mother tongue and yet:

The boy who brings him his tea in the morning calls him “Anna”
The people who sit in his cab call him “Boss”
Those who honk past irritably when he snakes his cab through the streets learning the routes call him “Oye Hero”
The women from the dance bars he picks in the early hours of dawn call him “Bhaiyya”
The room he rests his bones in at night is inhabited by people, like him, who don’t speak at all
The only people who speak his language are the cops looking for their bribe, and they call him “Shyane”- not quite the people you’d like to call your own

But then Bombay still welcomes all and sundry, gives them the wherewithal, for each in their own right. Where dog and cat eat in the same litter. Where the city almost always provides for your need, but never quite enough for greed. And where sometimes one person’s needs are forsaken for another’s greed. Yes, that happens too.

But that’s it… I am the happy sort and I don’t want to write about this stuff anymore. And I think to change the script of this page is just too much of an effort. It is unlikely that I will stop blogging altogether. So, full of hope I am starting afresh at the following address: http://smokeringsofmamind.blogspot.com/

Woody Allen (Annie Hal Opening Lines):

"There's an old joke. Uhm, two elderly women are at a Catskill Mountain resort. And one of 'em says: 'Boy, the food in this place is really terrible.' The other one says: 'Yeah, I know. And such small portions.' Well, that's essentially how I feel about life. Full of loneliness and misery and suffering and unhappiness, and it's all over much too quickly..."