Aamchi Mumbai!

My life in Manipal begins at the Syndicate circle and ends at Tiger Circle or might go as far as Kamath Circle if my delicate time permits me to travel to the campus buzzed MIT for some sumptuous dinner at the new food court.

I began scribbling this piece as I told my Dad I would, sitting in a Mumbai local train from Borveli to Andheri, which is now far different from what I experienced this morning. The cabin presently is accommodating an accurate 21 that in the morning carried a near 250, with each person’s face shoved into someone else’s armpit, literally! What you really need to be worrying about is the odor produced by the mixture of sweats as a collective collaboration rather than the individual contribution. Everybody talks to the other as if nobody else is listening. They sing songs in choir as if nobody else exists. That’s what seeing soo many people everyday does to you, I guess. Some old man talked of his retirement and his son leaving to the U.S for a high pay job. A woman complained about her husband. Young men discussing about their jobs, making more money and new weekend plans.  Some girl just wanted some Vodka! Well, I was listening. Nobody cared if you; the stranger is eavesdropping not.

Bombay is prosperous. All they repeated was- ‘Bombay, the city of dreams, where everything is possible. A city that never sleeps.’ The locals run beyond 1:30am into the night!

Bombay is cheap. Anybody can survive in Mumbai. A vadapav for Rs. 6, Nimbu pani Rs.4 and there is food everywhere. There are these, amazing stuff just made out of bread and hand-made like the mini pizza and sandwitches that are a big hit with the aam aadmi.

Bombay is luxurious. There are cafes at bay and alongside popular streets like the European style (the way, I like to call them) flooded with the fair skinned foreigners. They are a true bliss. The buildings grow notoriously longitudinally, oh, what do you think, we have no other choice, the only direction left, they will say! The night before on my way to Mumbai, the co-passenger suggested me to sit by the Marine drive where romance is high even under the hot commercial Sun and stare at the cars that pass by. He said, at first you’ll say this to yourself and then out loud; “fuck, when has India got so rich man?!”

I randomly remarked in my RABITS that I can’t eat too much cheese and a maximum of 5 spoons of pasta that I can relish in one sitting. I hate beer too; too much of a time and calorie consumption to get to a 50ml high spirits. But the combination of these at the Leopold’s was something I never tried before and I must admit, it was amazing. It’s that weird feeling of your stomach burning with hunger and the temperature rising with the beer and you satiating it with the cheese paparika sprinkled cream Chicken pasta alongside!

Life in Manipal may begin from TC and ends in KC but life in Bombay is beyond Borevili to Churchgate. . .

Back to square one!

 

My dad is a simple man. He has been a practicing general surgeon for decades now. He enjoys his government job like any other chronic government official.  He sleeps late, almost everyday and wakes up a bit late for his office. With a towel round his belly, and an old song on his lips, he goes directly to the pooja room after bath and lights an agarbathi that’s fills the house with its fragrance. 

He is that kinda person who socializes extremely well and cracks good jokes for everyone to laugh. People love to have him around. I learnt the socializing part well but when it comes to my poor jokes, I end up laughing at most of them, inevitably alone. He is always, well, most of the times in a constant thought loop, unable to hear you talking to him even though you are standing right beside him. Hell, once, he even asked me, who I was and what did I want as I stood at his cabin door waiting for him to finish talking to the other white coat bearers. That’s a different story all together!

He never did really beat me when I was a kid like my mother used to (to teach me the hard lessons) but the few times he got angry, I used to feel real bad. He used to let me enter the OT in those long scrubs while he was operating and let me stare at the blood soaked meat and the puddles of pus. He got me an ice cream each time I fainted off the stool and whenever I visited the dentist. I always preferred him for injections. He knows the ‘pain free’ way, believe me.

He made crazy bets with me for all sorts of change and got me speaking on topics to earn my prize money that went in my Santa bank.

He is a workaholic.  He loves the share market. He is also very generous to his poor patients. He spent years away from home, my mom and me for studies and clinical experience. He is always there to join me into an institution and re-visits the place to take me home only after the course is over, years later. He was there for my medical college counseling but he hasn’t visited Manipal, since then. I go home for vacations, of course! Yesterday, in one of his enlightening hour-long/once-in-a-week conversations he shared with me something that goes like this-

(Do leave your comments; I’m sure he would love to hear from you)

Into a mysterious world I entered naïve and innocent with perhaps a vacant head. All these years I continued to live in the same mystery and yet again I feel the same, fearing atrophy and turning vacant, as I can’t recollect names and dates which once I did so well. I wouldn’t compare to say that an unripe and a rotting ripe fruit are the same but I’m back to square one, I would say.

I fought with my father to get what I wanted and the world thereafter. In little arguments I spent so much of my life and all I learnt was to learn to compromise in the end.  I flew away from my native town in search of life and now, I fear my children will fly away from me. Back to square one.

They failed me in my final MBBS for not delivering the answer for a single question. I wondered why? Maybe, all the others did well and they needed someone to flunk and they found me and I convinced myself to reading the same for another six months. Back to square one.

I struggled in my government job for many years as a doctor and saved enough to invest in the share market to make some good money. I created many occasions and shared enough drinks to impress those expert brokers and businessmen and spoilt my health alongside. I made a lot of money but now; I invest it all to enjoy good health. Back to square one.

When our lifetime is almost spent and all the time is gone. What is that we see when we look back to? Life teaches us both good and bad. It leaves us experience to teach but aren’t we back to square one?