Anaahat

Mumbai: It was not long ago that I drove down the much awaited sea-link in Mumbai. It was Saturday and one of the first 5 toll free days. I drove with my friends with Michael Jackson rocking the stereo and a munching a hot makka under the rained Mumbai. The link was packed and the traffic was jammed for kilometres before the link began. The rich and the poor had come to get the first glimpse of the much talked about link. Some for the first-time feel, some for the free ride. We drove silently, watching the sea, our beloved city, people in the adjacent cars, with Michael Jackson creating a mood. I saw the beautiful design the cables made as we drove below them, I saw the waves crashing on the pillars – standing tall defying the current of the sea, and the sense of celebration on the whole. I was filled with awe and admiration. Above the cables I saw the heavens pouring. Mumbai had a new skyline and for the first time I saw how it looked with the buildings tall and short rising at the...

There is this weight on my heart. And it is not the heavy neckpiece. It is something which weighs and weighs your spirit down. It is something which weights you down. Something which makes a bit shorter, adds some grey hair in your dark blak mane, etches some dark circles under your beautiful eyes. Something which stains you. Which dirties the soul, which makes you a more thinking soul, and you start seeing things. Finding meaning in meaningless things. Searching for something more. Something philosophical. And there she was, walking with her own weight of abject poverty. Where a christmas doesnt make her days brighter nor a Diwali. She walks alone on the wet streets. An unbrella clutched in her arms, her saree tied tightly showing a little of her ankles, and a desolation in her step. Fighthing and wading through the rain water flowing on the cobbled street. I dont know her. I know the railing of my balcony I stand on. I know the two-storeyed parking in the opposite building. But t...