Two Cities

A recent business visit to New York City re-inforced everything I felt on my first short stay 2 years back – the similarities with my hometown, Bombay. I find it truly incredible that 2 cities so far apart in geography are yet so close in spirit. The smell of the air, pulse of the people, buzz in the environment is unmistakably identical. A thoroughbred Bombayite (will still take a while to get to Mumbaikar, lived out of Bombay for most part after it was rechristened to Mumbai), it was an instant feeling of home from the very moment I stepped out of JFK. Home at a magnified scale. Much taller buildings, much longer cars, much more oversized food portions, a lot less in your face poverty. But similar voices – of dreams, hope - of a better tomorrow. Silent noises of survival.

A home I have now grown away from......where I now long for the sounds of silence, stillness....a softer existence. Often wonder if these modernised sophisticated societies, standing as testimony to man's glory of progress, development have finally resulted in a net positive towards that elusive pursuit of happiness. Fulfilment, almost mockingly, appears to lie embedded in simpler realities. Ah, well, that's another story, another post.