Pondering in Pune

I wrote this a month and a half ago - just getting around to posting it.

We mostly don’t recognise when we have a good thing going. We realise what a good deal we had only in retrospect. But if we had realised that sooner, would we ever have new experiences, and adventures? Where do you draw the line at appreciating what you have and what you need to go in search of?


For example, I recently moved away from my family home to live in a strange new city, Pune, alone. While I was chaffing at the bit to get away, when faced with all the restrictions at my parent’s house, I did know what I would be giving up. Rules, curfews, innumerable calls in case of every ten minutes after the long needle hit the hour, anxiety if daughter is out after the sun goes down that no parent ever manages to completely quell in spite of respectable escorts of both gender accompanying said daughter. It goes on and on. I also knew the perks I’d be giving up. A higher middle class lifestyle, air conditioning in the room, clothes washed by servant or machine, dried, folded and or ironed and left on my beautifully thick mattress, or better, in my closet for me to pull out whenever. Food that easily aces inspection on nutrition, hygiene and taste.

Now, in a strange room, finally with the privacy and freedom that I’m yet to experience, I feel a pang of homesickness. Just for the three plug points for stove, fridge and laptop. Water that does not require waiting for the bucket to fill up, or a pump that needs switching on after trekking in your sleep wear through wet shrubs, weeds , ferns and the muck left behind by last night’s rain and residual croaking frogs that think that a cloudy morning is disguised dusk. (Which you know is a sure sign that snakes are nearby.)

P.S : there are snakes nearby - the girl who has the room next to me got a nasty surprise hissing at her when she entered her room last night and switched on the light.