Wingardium Leviosa!

Monday, October 12, 2015

Baby bird’s first solo flight


Making a decision to uproot, albeit for six months, is a big leap for me – more so, because I’ve always wanted to live alone and see if I could do it.

After packing and repacking and repacking for the Nth time, I finally was ready to let my rusty feathers loose. Only to realise when the cab came to pick me up at 6am that I’d left my laptop in the office :P

How awesome am I!

I got off the cab and ran via the Subway at the Hub, ran to office (thanking God for the one month gym training), only to bang the locked glass doors and scare the guard who was drooling in his sleep, to reaching my desk and finding it empty and looking confused for about 5 seconds to realizing a note was stuck on the table saying: Contact Security. I just prayed that it wasn’t with IT since those guys didn’t get in till 8am. Panicking, I ran back to the guard asking him where would they have taken my laptop to – he pointed to the other exit of the office and that guard was wide awake and made me fill up a book with details – grabbed it and RAN!!!

It only happens with Chelsea – yes.Week 1 in Bangalore: From scrambling to find accommodation, to exploring the streets on foot, taking in the sights and sounds of the city, the luxurious bed, silently screaming in the ricks when it swerved to avoid colliding head first into another vehicle, learning to trust Ola and Uber, the very swanky Windsor by ITC and sweet sixteen’s – it was a memorable week indeed. Oh, the office was a wrap too (:

Week 2 in Bangalore: Well this was all about settling into the new house. First day of moving in I spotted Roaches. Now those who know me well will attest to the fact that my mortal fear is, *drum roll*: Roaches. I shudder as I type. Anyway, I had a feeling that it wasn’t going to be a good first night even though I was literally choking on HIT. At 1am, after countlessly tossing and turning on the floor (still had to arrange for the furniture), I switched on the light only to find one $#$#^@&$# almost reaching my make shift bed. “That’s it. I’m outta here.”

I called up the landlady who was asleep. As I contemplated a hotel, she called me back and I asked if I could sleep on her sofa. Such a kind soul: I got a comfy bed, with the mosquito net and a bottle of water plus breakfast. I know I made the right choice by picking her. I slept over for two days and till date she keeps plying me with breakfast and dinner off and on. Bless you, Shree and baby Aarav!

My grocery shopping time is seriously legendary. I’d been fixing the list countless times as I didn’t want to buy anything extra but I also wanted to learn to cook – the only area which I feel that if I mastered – I’d be perfect *sniff, I know*. Lol. But it was fun being in charge of my own destiny.

Thanks to an entire organisation backing me and having faith in me, I was on my own. Scary at times, quite a few tears were shed when I felt like I didn’t know what I should do next. But everything that comes our way needs to be looked at as a blessing – even if it be a tough cookie.

Welcome it. Embrace it. Deal with it. Let it go. #MyLifeLesson

I love saying this over and over again but – people are kind. There’s so much of inhumaneness that you read/see that you keep saying: Where'd all the good people go?

When you have kindness showered on you from any quarter, you literally lap it up (and sometimes don’t even wanna let go). I’ve had nothing but kindness shown to me. Probably because I also have “dumbass” written all over my face, but still. Family and colleagues helped me out so often that I often wonder how does so much of pain and hatred even exist when all I see is the good that people met out?

There were challenges – uprooting people who were fixed like furniture, watching a friend and colleague packing up and moving on, poverty which always gets to me, the free flying garbage, going outside Bangalore to look at furniture (had to toughen up to not show that I was tired and scared), electricity woes…

And yet for all these tiny obstacles, I had so many highs – cooking some fabulous Punjabi aloo bhindi, chicken sukka and chicken curry, keeping the kitchen spotless, washing my clothes and keeping the house clean, spraying Roaches to even swatting a couple (huge achievement), getting the paper quilling set, practicing my guitar, watching two movies, completing three books, working and trying to understand how the transportation system works, dealing with tough colleagues and not buckling under pressure, knowing the names of the streets and landmarks – all thanks to the walking I’d done, booking cabs like a pro, going to watch my first movie “The Martian” alone in Bangalore.

I know I have to make friends but I don’t know how to begin – to be honest, I’m not hard pressed for company. I like being alone. I have things I want to learn, to create, to accomplish. Sure, I’d like company – but whenever that happens, it will happen. I sit sometimes so still on my bed and I can hear the sounds of silence. It’s in those quiet moments when I struggle with my inner being and ask for guidance and comfort.

I don’t have much – monetary and otherwise. So opportunities when they’ve come like a Godsend, I desperately hang onto them because I know I’ll rarely, or next to never get another shot. God listens – ask me. I’d been over and over asking to leave Mumbai as I was so shriveled and dead inside. This deployment has already begun a slow and yet a much needed healing process – to believe in oneself, one must learn to forgive oneself and accept that we’re human enough to want something that may not want us in return.

For some of us born with the wooden spoon – we really have to struggle to see and be part of the world. But this is what really makes us who we are. I’m eternally grateful for every single blessing that’s come my way. I may have little in the eyes of the world – but my little, is a LOT!

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