Category: NYC

Where does the heart lie?

I have a theory that I leave a little piece of my heart in every place I have ever lived – there is a sizable chunk which lives in Indore, a big piece resides in Pune, a couple of fragments in Goa and Nagpur, and most recently, a pretty significant portion in NYC. It makes for a pretty picture – a heart in pieces which span cities, countries, even continents … almost like non-creepy Horcruxes: neither deliberate, nor for immortality – these ensure that I am home no matter where I go.

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I have a theory that I leave a little piece of my heart in every place I have ever lived – there is a sizable chunk which lives in Indore, a big piece resides in Pune, a couple of fragments in Goa and Nagpur, and most recently, a pretty significant portion in NYC.  It makes for a pretty picture – a heart in pieces which span cities, countries, even continents … almost like non-creepy Horcruxes: neither deliberate, nor for immortality – these ensure that I am home no matter where I go.

Most often, this love is not for the city itself, but for the people and memories I have associated with those places. I love Indore, not for the Rajwada palace or chappan dukan, but because it’s where all my childhood memories are. Indore is home because of my people – my parents, my brother, my very first friends. I miss Indore for my alma mater – the school halls I walked for twelve years straight. I miss playing hide-and-seek with my friends and always, always hiding ‘out-of-boundary’. I miss Indore for the millions of evening strolls with my BFF, walking arm-in-arm, sharing gossip and secrets of the utmost importance, growing up together and finding our places in the world. She doesn’t live in Indore any more, and neither do I … but in my mind, Indore is where the Pooja-Varsha covalent bond lives and flourishes still; the ghosts of two little girls giggling and wheeling their bicycles along will forever haunt those streets. Oh yes, Indore certainly has a piece of my heart.

Pune is special to me because that was the first time I lived away from my parents, and made a new home. This is where I made friends who are now family. I miss Pune for my Biology professors, for the inedible food in the mess which unified one and all, for those late nights and early mornings, for the trips we took and the hills we climbed. I miss Pune for the long study sessions and even longer chai sessions in the garden. I miss the version of myself that I was in Pune – I look back upon her fondly sometimes, like some sort of younger sister I had. Pune for me is a picnic basket full of memories and experiences, of laughter and tears and teasing banter.

But my love for New York is a lot more intense – it’s not a warm familial feeling, but a fiercely intense sort of passion. I love my people here – an eclectic medley of people from all different walks of life I would never have met otherwise.  I cherish the independence I have here, it’s a whole different level of independence than what I had in Pune. No, this is not the first time I am living away from home – but here I am completely on my own, the training wheels I had in Pune are off, and I am carving out my own niche. I love the skyscrapers and the bright lights, I adore the museums and parks, the book stores and stationery shops, and the sheer variability in weather around the year.

In spite of all that, I find myself taking NYC for granted at times – like we often do to things which have been ours for a while. I get caught up in my daily routine and chores, and find myself lulled into complacency – but existing in a three-block radius does not do justice to the city. NYC has so much more to offer, and if I ever forget, she will walk right up to me in her sparkling stilettos and remind me, raising an eyebrow at my very audacity. In the middle of wondering if I need to buy milk, I will find myself walking through glittery streets in midtown, or finding a new subway station (I can NOT stop gushing about how much I love having a stop so close!), or catching a glimpse of the Manhattan skyline while walking across the Brooklyn Bridge –  and I am hit with a swell of emotion, a kind of pride and heart-stopping awe. What a marvel, what a sight! Where else can you saunter off to buy prettier shower curtains on a whim at midnight, or grab a slice of pizza at 4 a.m. just because? At the end of a regular day, I will be trudging home from work, tired and weary, only to stop and stare because it has just rained, and the streets have been swept clean, and are reflecting the sparkly glow from the street lamps, headlights of cars and leftover Christmas decorations, and at that moment, life shifts from ordinary to extraordinary. Such a magical alignment of phenomena, atmospheric and man-made, colliding together in harmony, creating this moment in time… yes, NYC has a big, big chunk of my heart. No matter how much I miss open spaces, and the ability to see stars at night. No matter how many ambulance sirens I hear (to be honest, I don’t even register them any more – living next to three hospitals will do that to you). No matter how small my apartment is, or how unreasonably high the rent is.

The real intensity of my feelings becomes clear the moment an outsider criticizes the city. I get riled up the moment someone’s opinion of New York is less that incredible, and it’s a very primal instinctive response – New York is MINE. Mine to love, mine to hate, mine to complain about. I am happy to hear people rave about it, but the moment they say it’s too dirty, or crowded or ‘just like Bombay’ – I will fight you tooth and nail no matter how irrational it may be. True love is irrational that way… I don’t need a reason to defend my beloved city. If you are an outsider, and don’t like it, kindly stay outside and keep your criticism to yourself. My city, all mine! My love of NYC supersedes my love for the people, the buildings, the Broadway shows – somehow it’s more than the sum of its parts, something more intangible than ever.

After twenty three years of calling myself a small town girl, it didn’t even take twenty three hours to morph into someone who adores the big city, and wants to be mistaken for a local. Someday I will leave Manhattan, but this love affair will always be something special. It’s even more special because it’s transient. I’ve always rolled my eyes at the clichéd I ♥ NY T-shirts, because somehow that isn’t nearly enough to encompass how I feel, and besides, they are so very touristy! But then again, maybe there isn’t a better way to explain it. And maybe being a tourist is a good thing, because they are the ones who gawk at every new building, every street sign, live (and live-stream) every single moment in the city. There’s a balance between being a local who can swipe their subway card without breaking stride, walk super fast, and automatically hold one’s breath while walking past the garbage piles, avoiding the drip-drip-drip from the air conditioners and jaywalking expertly… there’s a balance between that and the wide-eyed tourist who stops to appreciate all the sights. Maybe the only way to explain that, explain this whole ramble of a blog post is a simple heartfelt phrase:  I ♥ NY.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

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I’ve been holding off on this post, mostly because I don’t want to be the seasonal blogger, who gets inspiration to write solely from changes in the atmosphere. Does nothing else touch me, affect me, move me enough to get off my passivity and actually pen down my thoughts and impressions on this forum? But you see, while normal inspiration comes from little anecdotes and events in the blogger’s life, weather is something external, something beyond our control, and if that much raw power isn’t inspirational, well, what is? (Such rationalization!) Oh well, if weather ends up being my prime muse, so be it!

I heartily dislike the cold: arctic wind slipping through and caressing every bit of exposed skin with its long, frigid fingers, the wintry chill which permeates you with every icy breath you take, the sheer amount of layers you have to put on, even if you’re walking just three measly blocks to your destination. I feel miserable when my nose and tips of my ears freeze up – but that is nothing compared to frosty toes which I can’t even feel anymore, and am half-convinced that I’m going to pull off my socks only to reveal ten little blocks of ice. All of winter, I’m basically a popsicle in a pink coat.

I’ve always claimed that given a choice between living in the wintry depths of Siberia and the Death Valley in California, I wouldn’t even blink before picking the valley; how long I would survive in either is a whole different question.

However, no matter how cold the winter is, the moment it snows… I fall in love, all over again. Soft, quiet snow, drifting down all around you is somehow incredibly peaceful. It’s as if the snow cushions you in a cottony blanket and isolates you – from sound, from people, from your worries and turmoil. Because when you’re walking through the falling snow, you just exist, right there, in that beautiful moment suspended in time. The world is beautiful, dream-like, and leisurely. Instead of keeping my chin tucked into my scarf and striding along my way to hurry into the warmth of the indoors, I can linger, turn my face up to the sky to catch snowflakes on my eyelashes, and melt them on my tongue.

A soft cover of snow adds a sprinkle of magic to the mundane. In the immortal words of Roald Dahl, “watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you, because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it”. I believe that snow is one of the most likeliest of places to find that elusive magic, that spark, that little ember of wishful hopes and dreams and unfettered imagination which we all had in abundance as children, but that which we convince ourselves, with the advent of age and responsibility, is fanciful, unrealistic and ridiculously naive. However, if you put all of these hardened, cynical adults into oodles of piled-up snow, you can sit back and witness the magic – watch them morph back into the children they once were: making snowmen, women and angels, skiing through Central Park, clobbering each other with Quaffle-sized balls of snow (yes, I’m a lot more familiar with Quidditch than say, football – or is it soccer?), gleefully snowboarding through the inconceivably traffic-free streets of Manhattan, and most importantly, laughing with abandon. It’s a sight to behold – the carefree joy, the profound happiness. When it snows, it reminds us just a little bit of the children we once were, of the magic we once believed in.

And that momentary reminder is enough to keep me warm through the bitterest of winters.

 

Running on sunshine!

Summer is ice cream trucks and free concerts in the park, it’s lying on the grass sipping strawberry lemonade, and catching a glimpse of Manhattanhenge, when the sun aligns perfectly with the grid system of the city. Summer is screaming with abandon on amusement park rides, it’s checkered picnic blankets under canopies of green, it’s late night strolls along FDR drive with ice cream sandwiches. Summer is al fresco dining, outdoor movie screenings and kayaking. Summer is ephemeral, and hence infinitely precious…

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I read somewhere that August is the Sunday of summer. It’s the beginning of the end of a lovely time. Before you know it, the leaves will transition from a vivid verdant to fiery shades of yellow, orange and rust. They’ll gently drift down onto the lawns and walkways alike, crunching and whispering under your feet, ready to be raked away by some industrious soul into great big piles, which practically beg you to jump into them with a triumphant yell. Yes, autumn is all ablaze with color and cheerful crackling of merry flames in the fire, but it still signifies an ending of sorts – a wistful nostalgia of days gone past, the waning phase of the moon.

Summer, on the other hand, has rapidly become my favorite time of the year. This is hardly uncommon: it’s the norm, not the exception. However, this is the first year in my just-under-twenty-five revolutions around the sun that I’ve been this hyper about summer-lovin’. Back home in India, it was more of summer-likin’ … of course I would adore vacation time, long lazy afternoons spent devouring a new book, optimally positioned to get the maximum blast of  refreshingly cool air from the water cooler… evenings playing in sandboxes in my garden, running around with friends in the streets, playing different versions of hide-n’-seek, hopscotch, land-n’-water, red letter, crocodile crocodile, and of course the ever-popular sitoliya. Summer was uninterrupted stretches of time with family and friends, and train rides across the country to visit grandparents and cousins, uncles and aunts. Summer was picnics on beaches, and waves on the shore. Summer was languid strolls after dinner. Summer was all about juicy mangoes, coconut water and tyre swings. Summer always seemed to be a relaxed, more stretched-out period of time. But the downside of course, was that summer was always excruciatingly hot. Relentless heat waves, beads of sweat, the mercury reaching ridiculously high levels every coming year… needless to say, the monsoon season would be a blessed relief. Sure, school would start – but by this point I’d want to go back and see all my classmates and teachers once again (yup, I was that girl). Monsoons are beautiful and unpredictable, with growling skies, sudden flashes of lightning, and torrential rain on the parched soil, delighting crops and humans alike. The first rains would be eagerly awaited, and celebrated with energetic splashing in puddles, and sailing of paper boats.  So while the end of summer signaled a transition, it would always transition into something fresh and cleansing, something so joyously alive… that it always felt like a beginning rather than an end.

Summer in NYC may be just as languid and carefree, but so much more precious because there’s this sense of urgency, this gnawing knowledge that it is ephemeral, a few fleeting months which will whiz past before you can say “sunscreen lotion”. Summer here is balmy, yet nowhere close to the scorching blaze of Indian summers. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve felt it’s too hot. The highest temperatures here have felt merely pleasant, or occasionally warm. I am always amused at native New Yorkers fanning themselves and complaining nonstop about how hot and humid it’s been. They’ll have the last laugh though, when I commence complaining about the bitter cold the very moment it dips to 60 °F. But till then, I am on a mission to soak up every last ray of sunlight I can access. And oh, there’s so much of it… in the midst of summer, the sun refuses to set till half past eight in the night. It’s so thrilling to walk out of lab at the end of a long tiring day, see the world still lit up in dappling sunshine and realize that hey, it’s NOT the end of the day yet! Summer is bright and cheerful, and the only time of the year you don’t have to layer your clothes. You don’t require sweaters and jackets of varying thicknesses, scarves, mittens, snow boots or fuzzy socks (although I do have a soft spot for fuzzy socks…), which have to be piled on or shrugged off based on your surroundings. Summer is ice cream trucks and free concerts in the park, it’s lying on the grass sipping strawberry lemonade, and catching a glimpse of Manhattanhenge, when the sun aligns perfectly with the grid system of the city. Summer is screaming with abandon on amusement park rides, it’s checkered picnic blankets under canopies of green, it’s late night strolls along FDR drive with ice cream sandwiches. Summer is al fresco dining, outdoor movie screenings and kayaking. Summer is bubble battles, and chalk doodles on the sidewalk. Summer is ephemeral, and hence infinitely precious. I’m going to hold on tight to these last few days of sunlit glory while it lasts.

Summer lovin’, havin’ me a blast!