Dreams and travels

Its easy to forget that the reality we eat, sleep, breathe, taste and touch every waking moment is just a speck amongst the infinite universes that exist for every single person. Culture changes the lens through which we see the world, and what constitutes normalcy. But growingly so, modernization is changing the relationship places have to themselves. Bustling traffic changes the sidewalk smells from roadside food stalls to the heaviness of thick exhaust fumes, or walking past seemingly old, but renovated buildings, is accompanied by a sudden blast from cold air conditioners. I’ve heard India described as a brutal attack on the senses, and accurately so. Every feeling is heightened and amplified; colours are brighter, foods are spicier, sounds are louder- all this a uniform experience of a country that could easily be a continent in itself. The cultural strength and diversity of the nation is exquisite. Only by living there can the intricacy with which the traditional is weaved into everyday life be truly appreciated. Having been brought up in an urban setting in tandem with this way of life and then migrating to a Western secular way of being really made me conscious of the uniqueness of the time and place I had experienced. Revisiting yearly, almost like my own personal pilgrimage, I am constantly left with the lingering sense that places can be just as alive as the people within. My city is sharing the experience of countless other cities whose traditional lifestyle is being melded with Western ideas by an urgent burning desire to join other modernized powers. The standard of normalcy can no longer be considered a standard, but is an entity itself- evolving with new aspirations and an enthusiasm for entering into the unknown. Such change is personified in the ritualistic blessing ceremony during the inauguration of a Land Rover car dealership. A fusion of these juxtaposed ideas- a ritualistic blessing ceremony and a high end car dealership only describes one of the many instances in which my changing city is living out its new, self-defined destiny. In exploring the world and experiencing different cultures, I have learnt that it is adamant to remember that our interaction with a place only represents a fragment, a brief instance, a measly 5 minutes- during which we catch a moment of the life of the place in which we are; from which its own aspirations and hopes will lead it to a future known only by itself and its wandering dreams.