between-hurting-and-healing:

So here’s the thing about new cities, they’re really scary. There’s just so much about them to take in and absorb and you seem to notice all of it at the same time.

Temporary stalls where you have never seen stalls before, even though you passed by the same place daily. Weather that alternates between humid, sticky, hot, humid, sticky, and pleasant. Different ways of dealing with said weather that would have never occurred to you if not for observation. People using things as hand fans when the purpose of said things is something entirely different and unrelated. People looking at you oddly as you walk past them. People nodding and smiling at you approvingly but not creepily as you walk past them (though what you did to gain their momentary approval, you will never know). People glaring at you as you walk past them. People staring past you blankly as you walk past them. People who are too busy focussing on the road and not getting hit, who fail to notice you. People who refuse to focus on the road because listening to music is so much more important. Streets vendors you need to listen to carefully in order to realise they speak a language that you know, and not some alien, out-of-place one whose words you never heard of. Street vendors who are pretty clear about what they’re shouting (and selling). Bus conductors who are super helpful and tell you twenty thousand things about a place when you ask them if some place is close to a stop you intend on getting down at. Bus conductors who are indifferent to your presence and go about their business (as long as you’ve bought a ticket). Bus conductors who make you feel tiny and guilty about having gotten into the bus after waiting for it for 45 minutes. Ladies dressed in the simplest of sarees, discussing the words of a philosopher (and the rising prices of onions). Ladies dressed in formal wear, who hurl the most fluent abuses you’ve ever heard anyone hurling. Men who anxiously look at their watch, the sky, and the road at regular intervals, almost nervously, as though expecting a meteorite to hit their head soon. Men who half-whistle, half-hum their way through the very same day. Greenery and trees and shrubs and plants that make you feel amazed at its beauty. Potholes and leaking pipes and mud and sludge that make you hate yourself for stepping out. The greenery and the potholes within five minutes of each other. Flowers that have this heady scent that bring a smile to your face. Perfumes that have the same heady scent that make you frown and quickly run away from there. Restaurants whose menu you look, but happen to be places you know you will never eat in – ones that you know will take up all the money you have been saving for that book. Restaurants that are so cheaply priced that you order so much and you almost immediately regret it because the food tastes so bad. Restaurants that are cheaply priced and have good food and make you form a long-lasting bond of true love with them. Brightly coloured posters that advertise a job if you’ve failed school. Plain posters that announce the upcoming concert at an auditorium. Posters that are neither here nor there. Headlights from the vehicles on roads that make it difficult for you to see. Lights from stores nearby that half-blind you into not seeing. Old men who bless you when you help them cross the road. Little girls in pigtails who clutch onto you for a few seconds after you’re done helping them cross, and look at you with sincere thankfulness before they proceed to move on with their lives and buy that balloon that they had so bravely crossed the Big Bad Road for. The big everythings and the big nothings about a city. The little nothings and little everythings about it.

That’s the thing about new cities. They’re scary, yes.

They’re also like home.