Life In A City

Talking in phone with my little niece back home, she reminds me of how much I fancied living in a big city when I was her age. I saw the lights, the glitters and the glamour in those films and convince myself to believe living in a city would guarantee them all. What a disappointment!

In those days, if I were told that there are frequent power-cuts in big cities like Delhi or Bombay or that the roads are filled with pot-holes, I would shake my head in dispassionate unbelief. And, how would I believe that I would spent a large chunk of my hard-earned money on renting a single room that's more like a dark cave with a single door and a window (if you're lucky)!

Many of us living outside left behind their wives/husbands; children and or parents back at home. I don't want to imagine what those separated couples must be undergoing, but I can speak for myself and assert that it's not easy either –being single, working and living in a city.

If you are lucky enough to get Sunday off from your work, it's the only day when you can meet people of your kind -that too, only if the church is within a reasonable distance. That Sunday church service could be your only 'social life' for the week unless you are one of those crows who are comfortable enough in their fake peacock's feather.

On the occasional time you went to church, you might even saw someone who fasten you heart beat and you may stole many quick glances, but that's as far as you would go, because for the next six days, you would be pre-occupied with your work and you would even hardly have the time to think about her/him.

You woke up in the morning, clean yourself, have breakfast, pack you lunch and off you went to spent the next hour commuting to your work place. You returned home in the evening buying grocery on your way, tidy yourself up, prepare and have dinner, watch a little bit of TV and you dozed off. You repeated the same pattern the next day, six days a week, and will continue to do so in the future. That’s life in the city.

If you are lucky enough to have someone within the neighborhood, you'll at least have someone to chat with, or if your family or friends have telephone, you can chat away for something about your monotonous/redundant life bearing in mind your fast running phone bill. Maintaining a relationship is expensive, it not only consumes time, but also your money.

Life in a city provides many 'pros' and as much 'cons', just like in the rural areas. Big cities offer mostly materialistic things, and to enjoy them one needs to have a deep pocket, and most of us can afford that. While at home, what we are being offered are mostly aesthetic like clean air, water & environment, love, friendships and so on; the absence of which can make life pretty scary...

May be that's the reason why the word 'home' sounds so heart-warming. The mere thought of 'home' can heal you of the day's fatigue, it can relax you from the tension boiling inside you on over-hearing someone calling you names or making an unnecessary comments about you. The word 'home' can transport you across the seas and the plains and take you to those ranges of hills and mountains where you spent the happy days of your childhood. The word 'home' is transcendental; it’s therapeutic and transforming...