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Vizag.
I had quite forgotten how much I was in love with my native place.
You see, in the self-centered existences we sift through, there are some fragments one seriously choses to undermine.
The above realisation (the one above the above one, really) is one such figment.
I am a Telugu by birth. A Telugu Brahmin, as my mother would nod approvingly. And, in spite of the language and caste betrothed to me, I have never felt at place here. The feeling of passionate attachment never surfaced. It was an obligatory ritual to spend vacations here, something I never had a problem with. In fact, to be honest, have quite enjoyed. Thank you very much.
But yet, in spite of its brown-paper packaged happiness, I never once gave as much a thought to my fondness for the city of my birth.
But there happens to be, deep down , the base for senile love rooted in its imperfection. Imperfection that formed the crust of childhood.
Sugar-coated imperfection.
Of mango pulps being thrown about.
Of men, women and children alike, glaring at your jean-clad legs.
Of evenings spent discovering the wild mystique in touch-me-not plants.
Touch-me-not-else-I'd-wither plants.
Touch-me-not-else-I'd-grip-your-idle-evening-recollections plants.
There in its raw, crude nudity, lay the city of my birth battling old-world cynicism and new world construction with one go.
Staring awe-eyed at the plunging necklines available at Rs. 50 per seat.
And also at demureness and sanctity.
In hot humid afternoons losing themselves in the parched souls of the soothing wet earth.
Unflinchingly meandering from carnatic music to new techno-something-pop-something-folk-something tunes.
And yet, year after year, vacation after vacation, remaining painfully obstinate.
Oh, the empathy springing up for its bare-naked innocence, the empathy!