A matter of balance

Call this city loud, stinky or whatnot but there's one thing that we all take for granted: Mumbai's ability to let us just be. Although it's buzzing and almost tearing at the seam with its rising population and shrinking space, the fabled peace of mind is seldom far away from where we are. After all, Mumbaikars get used to the pace within no time leaving little scope for regrets. This quality—if you may—is something we ingrain during our stay here. And it applies to the non-human creatures as well. Be it the rat on the railway tracks nibbling away the litter or the crows who later meal on the fat rats who failed to cross the road. It'd be suffice to say that there's a balance in motion on a daily basis. Like for instance, my brother recently caught a dog (which I'm sure must have spent the night chasing cars) dozing peacefully under bright sunlight against the blaring noise of passing local trains. Well, who can you blame when this island city refuses to submerge at once?

Give and take

I like to say that dog is our best friend without a friendship band. And we keep hearing how the four-legged ones love us irrespective of how or who we are. But we somehow conveniently forget that it's not THAT simple. We tend to shower affection on them and they return the same, many folds over without fail. The trick lies in selflessness and that's what we miss while assessing this strong but strange bond between humans and the so-called canines. We love them with everything we have and then they make us love them with everything we have till the day they pass away. Despite knowing very well that their life expectancy is always going to be a hurdle in continuing the relationship, we still go ahead with it so as to make the most of the limited time at hand. Just a little trace of selfishness that was mentioned earlier. So, the conclusion being we might be able to replicate this success rate in relationship with humans too provided we give our selfishness and insecurity a break and embrace others wholeheartedly.

Eyes and lows

Every single day, we learn something about ourselves. Something we overlooked otherwise. Something others saw but we somehow failed to. Yesterday, a colleague pointed out that i walk in the office with my eyes fixed on the floor as if i'm searching for a lost coin. Until he brought this to my notice, i had no idea that i walked like that. That sounded like the walking posture of a serial killer with a day job. In my head, i walked like Brad Pitt or Ryan Gosling or both. But in reality, turns out i walk like...err.. me. For an introvert briefly experimenting with extorvertism, it was a mixed epiphany: "Wow, 27+ years on this planet spent avoiding as many eye contacts as possible!" 

Well done, me.

Mere coincidences?

• It's no mere coincidence almost everybody feels that they are somehow treated unfairly by others.
• It's no mere coincidence that everybody cheats but only YOU get caught.
• It's no mere coincidence that Carlos Slim is 73 and is worth $73 billion. 
• It's no mere coincidence that your trolls are precisely those whom you haven't followed back yet. 
• It's no mere coincidence that the crazies usually make all the difference.
• It's no mere coincidence that the expression 'take it from me' is mostly used by some of the worst misers. 
• It's no mere coincidence that finding goodness in a person ain't as easy as pointing out flaws.
• It's no mere coincidence that the ones having a problem with Twitter contests don't win anything anyway.
• It's no mere coincidence that we seldom bother to remember those who made us laugh. 
• It's no mere coincidence that words of wisdom always sound better when they are flowing out of YOUR mouth.
• It's no mere coincidence that glutton already comprise of the word ton.
• It's no mere coincidence that all the unrated folks find their rated counterparts overrated.
• It's no mere coincidence that the people we like are generally very similar to us.
• It's no mere coincidence that all of us are alive at this very precise moment.
• It's no mere coincidence that a lot of us abide by the temporal property of two things happening at the same time.
• It's no mere coincidence that drink and think rhyme.
• It's no mere coincidence that the term 'committed' is often followed by 'suicide'.
• It's no mere coincidence that hindu is an anagram of hundi.
• It's no coincidence that both facebook and facepalm has the word face in it. 
• It's no mere coincidence that ‘enjoy' and 'office' don’t complement each other in the same sentence
• It's no mere coincidence that although i've got nothing new to say, you're still reading.

The incontinent clouds

It rained earlier and much more than expected, bringing relief from the sun that basically has the hots for Mumbai. During the first few drizzles, romanticism was in the air. Chai dates pakoras. Life turns bearable again. For some days at least. Before the monsoon melodrama ultimately takes over and the following takes form: trains delay, roads clogged with water from the nearby gutter, traffic stagnates, the working class gets drenched, crib and reach office late, roof leaks, little kids fall ill leaving no clue why, couples rain-walking and then reach home shivering, the faceless BMC custodians caught napping as usual, walls create flaky art, filthy spots become filthier spots, football returns to the park, cricket sulks, rainwater fulfills potholes, the stench of damp clothes, sunlight-deprived underwears dying to be dry, people disappearing into manholes, lightning strikes (misses most of the time), cheap Alphonso mangoes, students bag holiday provided their schools reopened on time, photographers delight…

The legend of the fallen

Ever seen a horde of crows encircling just one woman on the street? I did. Yesterday. It was a scene straight out of a Hitchcock film. The only difference was these crows weren't keen on hurting her. They maintained a respectable distance. Maybe they knew that the lady in question is deranged and somebody who lives on the footpath—fending for herself. So in a way, she was a lot like them. But they didn't like what they saw. This woman in tattered clothes and with an unwashed face was holding a dead crow by its neck in her left hand and a small stone in her right; tapping the dead bird's head with it and laughing to herself. The crows may have nothing against human food but they don't like human contact. What ensued last afternoon was a demonstration of what happens when one of their kind is desecrated in public. They show concern. And how. Cacophony is too timid a word to describe the noise they created. Not sure what happened to that electrocuted crow in the end but am yet to witness a similar reaction in humans for the death of a complete stranger.