Some people have been saying, off-late, that I am becoming very philosophical these days. I guess ‘becoming philosophical’ is the most abused word in social parlance. I wonder why people say so. According to me, our existence will come to an end if we stop being philosophical. Being philosophical is nothing but a way of life. Phew! That was heavy.
Let me continue with this ‘way of life’.
The only thing that is constant is change. I think I was averse to change for quite some time. I guess it was sheer inertia, or, probably the lack of certain experiences that made me the way I am. I strongly feel that you cannot change your inherent nature. However, there can be a few tweaks to that inherent nature that can go a long way. And that is what I have been experiencing in the last 6 months or so. You, generally, need an incident or it may take more than one for you to realize that you have changed. I think everyone will agree with me that fog is a symbol of uncertainty. Well, not always. The fogginess of Jan 2010 helped me rediscover myself. Or, maybe, there is more to come.
I had to make a hurricane trip to my home town, Faizabad. It is a small district in South East Uttar Pradesh. My ideal itinerary has been a flight to Delhi followed by an overnight train journey to Faizabad. This time my flight to Delhi was delayed. CAT III or no CAT III, the compliance needed for flights to fly during low visibility conditions, all the airlines were impacted. Cutting the long story short, I reached Delhi at 6 PM, instead of the scheduled 3:10 PM. And I had my connecting train at 7:20 PM. Someone who is aware of Delhi traffic would have guessd by now that by no stretch of imagination I would have been able to catch the train from the (in) famous Old Delhi Railway Station in one hour and twenty minutes. And if it sometime close to Jan 26th when most of the roads are blocked for routine rehearsals or for some ‘standard’ security reasons, then the odds become all the more. My cab driver suggested that instead of going to Old Delhi Railway I should try and take a Metro from Dwarka. I agreed. I did not have too many choices either. The first change was this. I have started accepting things, at least some of them, that are beyond my control-unlike old times when I would have cribbed and swore incessantly.
There is nothing worse than slow death- when you know that you are running against time and you know that you are not gonna win.. It would have been better if my flight had landed after 7. I would have checked my watch a hundred times in that 60 minutes run from Dwarka to Chandni Chowk. And then you hope against hope that a miracle will save you. But then I think I mentioned in my previous blogs that Murphy is my second name ;-)
I called a close friend of mine, Neeraj, so that he could check if the train had left. It was already 20 mins past the departure time. Neeraj told me that the train was cancelled. It did not come as a surprise. Or, I guess the realist was taking over the optimist in me. But hold on-not yet. Looking back, I think I was lucky to even reach Delhi under the prevailing circumstances. Neeraj checked online and told me that there were flight tickets available to Lucknow for the next day.
Here comes the part that I found most pleasing and under the circumstances most surprising too. Neeraj stays in Rohini and there is no direct Metro connection from Chandni Chowk. I had to go Kashmiri Gate to take the train. And that meant that I had to take a rickshaw or an auto to Kashmiri gate. It was a bit cold. So, before leaving Chandni Chowk, I decided to have a cup of road side ‘chai’ (tea). There is something about these road side ‘delicacies’ that continues to remain unparalleled. I am not a tea/ coffee addict. So, these rare caffeine moments are truly relished by me.
I decided to go for a rickshaw. And I am glad that I did that. It’s fun to ride a rickshaw once in a while. I had not had roasted peanuts in sometime. So, I decided to take some peanuts before getting on to the rickshaw. The manual labour aside, it was a fun ride. There was a nip in the air. I was savoring the peanuts. I wasn’t sure where to dispose off the peelings. The immediate second thought was “What the fuck”. And Delhi roads became a bit dirtier that they already were. I know I am writing at the cost of drawing wrath from some of my closest friends. But, I guess it’s good to be savage at times.
You will definitely invite looks from the bystanders if you are even slightly out of place. I guess wearing a nice blazer and sitting on a rickshaw do not go hand in hand. And this was made every evident by almost everyone who saw me. The reason of those looks could be something else also-but I seriously doubt that. Again, being oblivious to such things is the mantra. We end up brooding about what the society will think…the list is endless. I think nobody gives a hoot and I think we should not give a damn either.
A simple road side chai on a cold winter morning, or the road side chaat in the evening, or an occasional beer with a close friend, or a long drive on a breezy evening, or reading a book over a cup of coffee, or the occasional rants of an idle mind in the blog, or the dhan-te-nan in a pub can make so much of a difference to our mundane lives.
I guess we look for that big happiness in life and in the process tend to miss out on those small pleasures. What we forget is that the total is the sum of its parts.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
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