Long time, no sea
Home is where your heart should be. And those who get to go home don’t realize their good fortune. Not their fault either because we tend to take things for granted provided they are easily available. Take for instance, electricity. We can’t do much without it and yet its ubiquitous nature has turned us blind to its sheer necessity: with great power comes greater ingratitude?
I think of home all the time and I wonder why I’ve stayed away from it so long now. In fact, this is the longest I’ve been away from my folks. This is also the longest I’ve stayed away from the sea.
The trouble with landlocked cities is they don’t know their limits. A city with a coastline knows very well where its ambition must end. A place like Gurgaon doesn’t learn—on time — when to stop; she will keep pushing until there is no coming back. That’s what a sea does to a place; it works like a giant evaporating mirror. You and I can pretend to be deep, a sea is not only deep but also nurturing. It takes care of us in ways we can’t understand. Let’s not forget we came from the sea long before we moved out of Africa. There is no excuse to stay forsaken and deplete ourselves of its cool breeze.
I grew up by the sea and I genuinely believed that that’s how it was going to be like for the rest of my life. Trombay jetty is where I learnt about the sea and its people — brave Koli fishermen and fiesty fisherwomen, their love and respect for their office; these folks were already leading a non-polybag lifestyle long before videos of turtles with straws stuck in their nose started floating on the Internet—along with mangroves, weather, cricket, friendship, and much more. Going to the jetty was a common refrain from having nothing else to do. Either you went alone and thoughtfully walked the promenade only to sit on the rocky steps to admire the sea meet the clouds, or your group would tag along and you’ll talk nonsense for the most part while enjoying the salty wind. That was how my childhood trended back then. As of now, that promenade is cordoned off to public and only fisherfolks are allowed; a measure effective post-26/11.
Even after (eventually) moving to Navi Mumbai, the connection with the sea didn’t end for me. Every time the train crossed the Vashi creek—above which lies the bridge connecting Mumbai to Navi Mumbai — I always made it a point to look outside. The compartment might be crowded but the horizon was seamless and it always struck me how lonely a fisherman could get on a tiny boat. How does he amuse himself? What if he doesn’t get enough catch for the day? How long does he work for? Such questions used to assemble in my head for a party. Sometimes, there would be nobody except thick marsh for as far as I could see. And at other times, the sea would be in a proper reflective mood. My favourite moments happened during monsoon when I’d hang on the train door and could see the pricking raindrops on sea surface.
Beautiful, beautiful stuff.
Every place has something more to give and something less to take from us. While living in there, we fail to observe this business model. It’s only after moving out we notice the finer prints. When I was shuttling between the two ends of Mumbai, I was getting the meaning of contentment but I was forfeiting the cause of success. Now that I reside in a dusty hot city, I can only presume the extent of my bargain here.
A friend of mine recently asked me what do I miss the most about home, this blog post is an answer.
