Mumbai

Today I realised what I love and miss most about Mumbai, or to be more correct, what it signifies in my life. It is a city I have grown to love, not as much as Delhi, and for not any of the same reasons, but in a very different way. For reasons that are at most 20% because of it being Mumbai and not XYZ city. But that's not the point. I love what being here, even for a day, makes me feel like. I am so much more alive today. And again, today was a good day...even for a "Mumbai day", so I am exaggerating (also I;ve been up for almost 24 hours now) but the fact is, this moment, this place, is making me feel much more alive than I've in some time now.

Perhaps the part I love the most is coming home at 3 am, because I want to or need to, without caring, without asking, and without being answerable to everyone. Walking back home talking to oneself, doing my own stuff, working hard, partying hard, living my own freaking life! Mumbai allows me to feel this way, like I'm living a longer, fuller life. Of course this isn't complete. There are things and people and feelings I want which I won't get here, and thus, netting off, I'd rather be who and where I am than this. 

But this feels amazing. Right about now. Thank you.

The art of not caring

There's one thing I have to give to Mumbai: it's one city where by and large people will leave you alone as long as you don't fall in their way. The apathy or indifference or whatever you may choose to call it, is fairly high, and there are both good and bad sides to it.

On one hand, there would be people like my deranged lunatic landlady who only care about getting more and more money out of you and be completely unsympathetic to your point of view. People will largely refuse to help you out of any humane instincts, only if it profits them somehow. The fanatics will get away with whatever speeches they want to make and the govt will get away with not doing anything because nobody will care enough to question, and those who comprehend will not care enough to vote.

But on the good side, it means by and large you can be yourself and random people would not stare at you. Neighbors will not get nosy even if you consistently come past 2 am at home. If you manage to stay away from the moral police types, you can conveniently walk hand in hand with a guy, wear skimpy clothers, get sloshed etc. And you can sit at Marine Drive alone at midnight, stare at the dark sea and cry all you want for an hour and nobody would bother.

I feel slightly lost in the hurried sea of people running about me. Part of it could be being forced to grow up so soon, and being so alone in all of it. Dunno. Nobody cares for anyone, and that's why they just add "take care" and absolve themselves of any responsibility and concern. Nobody expects you to care, either. Is this what it's like to be an "adult"?

If you care, you just get disappointed all the time. If you don't care nothing matters so you are never upset
- Calvin

Maybe I'm over-reacting. It should get better, right?
Life is not easy, but it's still good.

330 am

As I woke up my building guard yet another time this week, at an ungodly 330 am of the morning, he added, alongwith his usual sleepy marathi gaalis, "Sunday ko bhi sabse late?" Given that the taxi driver dropping me off had already asked if our call center worked sundays also (the Meru guys are now used to the 2 am phone calls from or office address), I wondered if it was a happy thought that I returned home at night happily alone as my team slogged another half hour in office or whether it was just sad to be happy about it on a sunday night (or monday morning!). It is a beautiful time of the day, with silent streets waiting to wake up, the sea watching the shores like a watchdog, the stray cars, policemen, couple and bunches of random people loitering around, and enough silence to let you talk to yourself, with whatever energy left. Some days though, the newspaper guy beats me to my home, and once in a while my roommates look at me bewildered because I'm back home before they've slept off. Both are amusing events

This city, and this job, has so far kept me off any monday morning blues whatsoever.

Caught in a time-wrap

What is the deal with time? Either it does not move, or it flies.
Right now, the weekend that went feels like it was about two or three hours at most. And at the same time, last week and the last post feel a year ago.
Indeed, I was in Delhi little over 24 hours ago (for the weekend - campus recruitment work, etc ) and even that feels like at least last week. Damn it, I miss it (and all the people there) already!

Just what is the deal? Is it this city or this job? Or is it me? Am I aging 10x quick and on track to become old and wrinkly and fat and ugly?

Sigh...but on a lighter note, I have much better questions to ask. Like why are there so many rich people in (certain parts of) Mumbai. It's almost obscene, in the middle of the slums. And the kind of things these people buy. So you know, one day, I braved myself to try some shopping (really needed some clothes, otherwise, shopping is the boringest activity ever for me) and spent what felt like half a day (~45 mins) looking at stuff that I wonder who buys (esp at that price) and then another hour to pick up some stuff at fabindia/pantaloons that I could fit into. Seriously dislike shopping, esp alone (unlike my very girly and pinky boss (:P) who goes shopping...oooh..new stuff...wowwww types ) :D

This weekend, as I said, I was in cool, hazy delhi for work+fun. It didnt feel alone at all, though the public transport sucks in comparison to mumbai. I hate my company for making me shift here.
And making me shop alone.
Among other things.

Like missing living where the heart is.

Single in the City

Yes, I'm back.
A million apologies are due for this prolonged absence from this page, rather, from blogosphere. You can blame this new job for the most part which did not leave much time, and more importantly, any energy to come up with something suitable enough to go up here. For other than the most part, I accept the blame. I'm just really lazy. Besides time not working is for sleeping. And surviving Mumbai. And discovering Mumbai.
Right?
Wrong. Surviving Mumbai is easier if I share it here. And hence I've decided, I'm going to be more regular on this page (yey!) even if it means boring you and you and you with crap. And for lack of creative insight, I'm going to call it the "Single in the City" series.
Once in a while though, regular stuff will keep pouring in and out.

Deal? Thumbs up? Let me know.

For now, for this one post, let me assume it's a better idea than nothing, and getting everything from requests to pleas to orders to threats about updating the blog! :)

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Among the things that I really love about this city, is how nobody ever stares at you. Unless they're tourists from Delhi. You get the picture? You can walk down the street, alone in the middle of night, or hand in hand with your boyfriend, or in skimpy clothes at 1 am, or with a bunch of noisy friends and almost nobody will ever turn or stare back at you.

Maybe people just don't have the time - this city moves so fast, everyone is always in a hurry to get somewhere. Maybe nobody really cares - in a city of 2 crore people and way too many celebrities, you're well and truly a nobody. I don't know. But what I do know, is that this anonymity is fairly liberating. Somebody like me who's lived all her life in a city like Delhi which teaches you to be really conscious and really protective about your surroundings, life in Mumbai feels like a safe, blissful haze. It feels a lot less about you, if you know what I mean.
And hence, even in the mad rush, it gives you a few minutes of space to just step back and reflect, to ask a few questions, and to listen to the silence of the infinite sea and sky.

Spending too much time with yourself, too, is a hazard in a place where you're essentially alone and often lonely. My job tries to compensate with presenting me loads of crazy days where all I do is somehow wake up to get to office, only to come back home post-midnight and crash. And the past week stretched the midnight into early morning a bit too consistently, so it was essentially one long sleep-deprived stretch where the mind refuses to work. Which is good in the sense you're too busy to be bored, too sleepy to be lonely. And you don't have to push hard to find someone to go out and spend time with forcefully at least one day of the weekend, because it's legit to sleep.

But keeping busy is awesome, the breaks throw up interesting thoughts. And for someone like me who prefers skipping the office party to just lying down at the Marine drive for 45 minutes all alone, it's a refresher. And life does start feeling good again, when the woman selling roses on Marine Drive stops by and kindly offers, Chinta mat karo madam. Aapka friend aa jayega, which helps me break into an instant heartfelt laughter.

Yeah, I'd wait. What I'm waiting for, shall come.

:)

Single and available???

My colleague at work was complaining yesterday, how all the nice guys (half-decent was her choice of adjective) in this world are taken and how we suddenly live in a terribly super-committed world. One could feel the agony in her words and see it in her eyes - "..and they don't ever break up either" - and now when I think about it, on one hand I still know a ton of people (esp guys) frustratingly single and ready to mingle, but that number (esp of the good ones) is definitely going down alarmingly. Have the times changed, or have we really become so old and settled in life? People I know are getting married for God sakes. Will I ever be able to find someone 'half-decent' to 'settle' with, *if* God forbid I ever want to, in another 2 or 3 years?

That is to say, should I start panicking about dying a maiden just yet? :P

On a related note, does anyone know any cute available guys in Mumbai? :P You are allowed to self-recommend, but self-introspect first.

On another note, I did a ton on household shopping yesterday, and fixed dinner and breakfast. I like the rhythm of things moving. :)

And does anyone know, why does every shop in Mumbai, including Dominos and Barista, have their shop boards in Hindi (and sometimes marathi, but that's logical) alongwith English? Curious.

Somwhere in the middle...

Here, in this world, things happen too quickly sometimes. And at other times, they feel as if the sameness has consumed all your life.

Here, in this world, I feel a little weird, trying hard to belong, yet the convoluted detached style of living of all the 'mature', warm and friendly grown-ups around me feels so unreal. What is missing?

Life is a roller-coaster, and should you forget that, it makes you a consultant.

I cribbed when they ruined my farewell three weeks back. Should I crib now, when I was just about getting the hang of this routine and I've been suddenly asked to leave the project mid-way onto something new, in 'hometown' Mumbai.

Bottomline, here I am, all alone at a swanky airport, cribbing about flight delays like those regular consultants, wondering just where is life going. Yes, this is it, that point where I need to go make my 'home' in an unknown city in a job that grows stranger by the day. Without any help, far away from those I love. Welcome, Mumbai.

It's just me. And my life. I can end up the happy all-conquering superwoman with a gazillion new friends, or I can end up the overworked fatigued depressive maniac.

Like most things though, I suspect, this too will lie somewhere in the middle.

The one in which I talk of being corporate, and housewifely

So, I'm a fortnight into the job. Wow. How hectic has it been is evident from the lack of posts on this page and a growing list of to-read stuff on the reader, among others.

Has it been exciting? Yes, I'd say, for the most part. It's a little confusing at times, a little lonely and slightly intimidating, but mostly there's a buzz, so far. It should stay for the first project, methinks.

Has it been tiring? Most definitely. My body revolts at 14-15 hour work days after so many months of lethargy.

What else does it feel like? Slightly weird, very grown up, and all the corporate frustration around me feels (so far) very unfamiliar. The people are good though, and things look sure to get warmer and faster in the next month. And the 35 km commute to Gurgaon is killing me.

Oh, and I got my first salary. :)

The lucky bit is that my first three weekends are all 3-day. Talk about spoiling habits! And so, last weekend I took a wonderful trip to Lansdowne (more on this should follow) with a bunch of friends, that ended up a nice roadtrip and jungle trekking combined. This weekend, I took a trip to my "home" in Mumbai. Had to finish some formalities, and wanted to know how it felt like living in 'my' home (at an outrageous 10k bucks per night :P ). Spent a lot of time setting up, cleaning, buying provisions, mopping, putting up the curtains, making the kitchen functional (cooking the ritualistic coffee and maggi etc) and generally being super housewifely. (My housemate is a little lazy at all this and struggling very hard at living all alone in a new city) Now the home is fairly habitable, though my housemate doesn't intend to cook, so it would have to wait for me to move in to make it totally home-like. There was nothing more to do in Mumbai though (everyone hits at my housemate, none at me :( :( :( ) except watch society Dandiya and meet Yashshri (finally, after several attempts over at least 2 years!) :P

So bottomline is that in the last two weeks I got a taste of the corporate and the housewifely shades of evil, uncomfortable grown-up life, and though it'd take more time to grow into it, and it's gonna be a bit before I have to be a superwoman and do all of it simultaneously, I will survive.

I think.

Anti-climax II

Imagine a heavily melodramatic sentimental movie scene featuring a judaai among loved ones, or a farewell of some sort. Imagine, for the sake of the effects, a teary bidding-adieu moment at a railway station where one person is leaving for some xyz place for long, and in the final few moments before the train is about to leave, looks back at the place people and memories he/she is leaving behind. In fact, add flashbacks, loaded dialogues, background scores or even full-fledged sob-songs to the scene just so the flavor is complete.
So, the person finally breaks the embrace of his beloved people and place, who're perhaps secretly thankful they're gonna get a reprieve from this person but give nice sobby goodbyes anyway, and gets on the train. The train moves a few metres and suddenly comes to a stop. The station master tells you that because of "technical difficulties", the train cant leave right now, and there's a full 24 hour delay. So you have no choice but to go back, bag and baggage, to your home or whatever, and those people who just bid you goodbye and had already reallocated your room have to accomodate you again.

You understand the anti-climax, right?

Well, that just happened to me. :)

Okay, of course there wasn't so much drama and I still retain a room here at home, but you know, I was supposed to shift to Mumbai today and stuff, and everybody said goodbyes (I'd even done the packing!) and suddenly my company HR says, why don't you report in Gurgaon office on Monday instead of Mumbai office :)
Apparently, the project I've been staffed on, the team is in Delhi, so it made no sense to fly to Mumbai on sat and back on Sun because the mon morning meeting was in Delhi office and my ticket's cancelled. Now I don't have any other details at all, including whether this is a one-day, one-week or a one-month delay. I don't know anything yet, except that people who're happily calling me since last evening hoping to say bye, shoo, go to bombay, are being met with disappointment that the teary farewell has been postponed.

So, I'm gonna shift to Mumbai afterall (I'm so not unpacking!), but it could be later than sooner, and I have no clue when. Meanwhile I continue to pay a gigantic rent on a place in Mumbai I'm still not living in, and my poor flatmate has to grapple with setting up the house all alone. All this, when I'd always asked for a Delhi posting in the first place.

Life's suddenly exciting again. Fingers crossed for Monday. Wish me luck.

Phew, welcome to consulting, Taru.

Ghar hai, ghar wali chahiye ;)

In Mumbai, househunting for the past few days, I've discovered how hard it is to make a home. Finally found a decent place, 2bhk fully furnished et al in Prabhadevi, but it's been three days and signing the papers stays a struggle still. Hoping to get possession by tomorrow evening, so I can peacefully return to Delhi.
Not entirely peacefully though, for I still need:

• A third roommate, preferably someone who works in Nariman Point/fort area itself (koi mumbai mein ghar dhoond raha hai kya?! Please batao!)
• to make lists, pack and arrive by 12th, and settle in!

Phew!

Information overload

Gyaan. Names. Faces. Roads. Process. Rules. Rigor. Shortcuts. Opportunities. Assessment. Logistics. First impressions. People. Eccentricities. Addresses. Judgements. Rental. Tax. Behavior. Habits. Mistakes. Questions. Communication. Over-communication. Integrity. Hesitation. Truth. Insight. Database. Pivot charts. Money. Hours. Bills. Luxury. Food. Price. Value. Alcohol. Richness. Cheapness. Insecurity. Zeal. Competition. Fakeness. Culture. Help. Hypothesis. Knowledge. Impact.

Who? What? Why?

The beginning.

News flash

I'd be in Mumbai this Sunday, and will stay on till the next Sunday, 2nd August.
Any of you dear folks wanna catch up an evening/weekend, let me know!
Also, if someone can help me find a home in Mumbai, or knows someone who needs a roommate, be my saviour!!

:)