I had never stepped out of my house alone, and was raised in a constraining and non compromising big Indian family. I was 24 years old and devoid of any story I could call my own. I was tired of being sheltered. Of being told what to do, where to go, and especially so, where not to go. In India women don’t tread in their lives alone. They need to be taken care of and the time had come where my care-takers needed to change hands. So my overtly ‘caring’ family had decided that I needed to be married off.
More often than not, you travel to escape and that’s what I did. I escaped. I pooled together some savings and got a plane ticket to Bombay. And with a backpack of two books, tooth brush, a change of clothes and a notepad, left the only city I knew all my life. I shut my cell phone down and the aircraft window. I had never felt so immensely alone and so alive at the same time. It’s like a world full of endless possibilities and the excitement of carving a whole new identity on a blank slate. I was 24 and this day forth, I could be whoever I choose to be. That plane ride changed my life. What it means to travel, to leave something behind you and move away. You don’t touch the brim and leave.
Two hours later, I emerged in this city. No lover, no family, just self and a lot of dreams, I set out to find my destination. I like to believe I’m still traveling and all that I see, I must see before I get to where I need to be. Bombay opened its arms to me immediately. I travel from the most insane clubs in Bombay to the most dreadful slums of the world, with the same fervour, the same excitement in my eyes and no vision. After all, if we always know what our destination will look like, I reckon, we stop living each passing moment and sleep through it looking for that one perfect tick of the clock. So I look, with the same raw appeal to each block of the road, to each sign on a rickshaw, to every bite I take of the road-side food in Bombay and I smile at every new face. Bombay is the place to be if you’re not pacing to and fro and can come to terms with the reality that life, just like this breathtaking city, is messy and is chaotic, and that’s just where it finds its beauty.
On a map, I’ve traveled less than 500 kilometers, but its one full life away, and it made me the finest and the most spirited version of me, and I will forever look back to the courage it took for that 2-hour journey and overcoming the fear of stepping out alone and just be.
15 comments:
if the bird would had waited for a favorable breeze before hurling itself into the unruly winds, probably it would have never learnt to fly. And for the loneliness that follows, it would be better expressed by repeating what u have already heard from me; ''dur se dekho to chand ke sang tare bi pavogey / karib se dekho to chand ko bohut tanhaa pavoget // dunya ke sabi jurmath aisehi hain / bahar se chamak andar se gutan pavogey.
Keep doing what u do, Dominique, being free. U don't know but ur writing gives hope to lot of people. Couple of days back recieved a call from a frnd, she asked me whether i had read one of your post (unlearning). i asked her why she said it gave her hope to know she was not alone
The untold want,
By life and land ne’er granted.
Now, Voyager, sail thou forth,
To seek and find.
The untold want,
By life and land ne’er granted.
Now, Voyager, sail thou forth,
To seek and find.
The untold want,
By life and land ne’er granted.
Now, Voyager, sail thou forth,
To seek and find.
u write brilliantly, i must say.
I have read this before, I think. Brilliant then, and brilliant now :).
:)
You are a brilliant writer :)
iss kahani mai sachchai kitni hai?
@Al-Haqu-Murun
Bahut achcha sher hain.. aur Fountainhead? :) :)
Khushi huyi ki tumne padha :)
@A Killam
Yours? Beautiful it is.
@Kalpak
Thank you! :)
@Zubin
Yeah, I mailed you this sometime back. Thank you! :)
@Rachit
:) Thank you, much too kind.
@The Young Saint
Every word.
i get so much pleasure reading blogs... can relate to the experience...
That journey makes you feel truely liberated... init! Awesome post tha madam
The generation of our parents have always believed in Playing Safe (you know, how they always preferred sarkaari jobs over private ones). I could really relate to it. I took a decision 3 years back and I am yet to prove it to be right (to myself, more than to anybody else). But given a chance today, I ll again take the same decision, whats the point in living if you cant feel alive.
Reminds me - "The greatest risk in life is not taking one".
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