The Musings of a Travelled Mind

One of the best reasons to travel goes beyond the reason to explore foliage, new waterfalls, spectacular scenery, or a monument; it’s the people. Its ironical how these friendships, even though hard-pressed for time, leave more of a lasting impression than ones that take their own time to age.

You could argue that this friendship is a mere illusion. That it ends before you have a chance to learn the ‘dark side’ of this acquaintance. Like a one-night stand that’s looked at, in retrospect. But while you’re there, in company of a relative stranger in a foreign land, the exhilaration of a random interaction makes you speak as frankly as you would in your head. Could explain why people come back with a sense of self-reflection.

On a recent trip to Auroville, my default travel partner - Mahu (the importance of the right travel companion is seriously underrated, it’s as crucial as picking a life partner. For a short life; that lasts a week or so. Okay so not *as* crucial) Anyway I digress.

On a recent trip to Auroville, Mahu and I had the fortune of interacting with people of diverse beliefs and priorities. We were staying on the outskirts of Pondicherry. Located on desolate beach between Auroville and Pondicherry, we were given a tree house with a thatched roof and a bunch of bamboo shoots for a door. Perched up on this tree, we were literally greeted with a view of the sea every morning we raised our backs to wake up (I mean it, the tree house didn’t have curtains to roll back).

It helps when two girls travel alone. One - for the freebies (being treated to meals, drinks etc), Two – helps shed the protective shell that surrounds us at home. So, we got going on a rented bike that we managed to fall off from only thrice during our trip, Mahu’s personal best.

Now what people forget to mention about Auroville is that there is a serious dearth of watering holes here. So when our eyes fleetingly spot a ‘something something BAR’, we halt our scooty to go in. Turns out it’s a ‘Coffee Bar’ but it’s too late to turn back now - it was a real pain to park the scooty and the effort mustn’t go waste. I do not exaggerate when I say that we had the world’s finest cold coffee at this joint. Here, we couldn’t help but overhear some expats converse about their volunteering work. A bunch of friendly people, it happened to be one of their birthdays. Thanks to Happy Birthday to You being a universal song, we joined in the singing and were eventually invited for a house party to celebrate the same. From what I’m about to explain, you will realize I grossly misused the term ‘house party’. We were welcomed into a home where everyone seated themselves in a circle. In the background, there played a sorry excuse for music. I swear, it played in decibels that only dogs could have partied to. People only conversed with the person either to the left or right of them. No cross-over conversations from one corner of the room to other. Virgin to this experience of recreation, Mahu and I seated ourselves in opposite corners of the room. Here, I had the pleasure of talking to a boy from Germany (a place I ended up making my next trip to, and the last paragraph of this blog). He mentioned that all of them, hailing from different countries, have come together to volunteer at some place known as Sadhna Forest. With no fixed itinerary planned anyway, we left for this forest the next day. I’m probably going to make a big deal out of what we witnessed there as we city girls have led a cushioned life (for some reason, Bombay girls are given serious grief for not knowing what lies outside the city limits). Greeted into a space that shared an uncanny resemblance to the set of Lost, the volunteers at Sadhana Forest had built their own residential tents for the mission of planting trees. Apparently they had been peddling on their cycles all morning just to create a safe bank of electricity to welcome us, with lit lanterns and the works. A bunch of South Korean students we met there, mentioned about studying in a travel school. Which means they studied on-the-go, constantly travelling around the world and imbibing it’s learnings until the age of 16. In contrast, I spent my schooling perched on the 3^rd row bench, with travelling limited to the last row bench. After spending a whole day with them, clumsily trampling their precious rooted plants, and helping them wash dishes, we were sent back with a newly formed emptiness we didn’t know to exist. Sometimes meeting people and learning about their experiences fills you with enough envy to despise your own relatively inconsequential existence.

Every place extrudes a different vibe. If Auroville had put me in a mode of self reflection, Germany had the exact opposite effect – don’t care about what lies tomorrow.  For someone to whom the definition of abroad remained limited to Dubai, Germany was an eye opener. You know how a restaurant with good ambiance can make or break the outcome of your meal? Picture the whole of Hamburg city being an intricately crafted ambiance only for the purpose of dreamlike interactions. As opposed to Auroville, there was no shortage of watering holes in Hamburg, Germany. Seated on a pavement pub, immersed in the music of the roadside violinist, I met people from varied nationalities.  When you meet someone with a far complex personality, and only have a limited time to explore that intrigue, you cut through the small talk. An African friend and I sat together to burst stereotypes from our respective countries. For example, I had to specify that just because I come from the land of Kamasutra, Indians do not, at all times, demonstrate Kamasutra positions on the street. It’s not an artsy road show. Though, I’m still not sure she believes me on that front. In return, she painted a beautiful picture of Africa for me – one that went beyond malnutritioned kids and well-endowed penises. Good thing that short travels leave long lasting friendships as their by product.

Ofcourse, my only and biggest regret will be that I left Hamburg without finding out why the Germans named their city after a hamburger.

To Bait, or Not to Date?

Just as mosquitoes can breed in the most unlikely places, so can romances.

Candle-lighting, rose petals, fragranced breeze are passé. Meet – rubber carpet, damp air, dumbbells – the new components found effective in creating a romantic ambience. Grown rampant post the exploitation of all other dating spots, Gym Dating has come to experience considerable traction in recent times. This concept is defined as, “The flirty banter between two individuals, usually in or around sticky, sweaty environment. Known to cause the hogging of workout machinery. May or may not result in eternal love.”

While serious fitness enthusiasts grace the gym in the mornings, serial daters make up for their lost evenings by socializing at the gym. The latter kind are easy to spot. Sporting gym bags big enough to take on a trip, they come prepared to spend a quarter of their day in the premises. Following their ritual to the T, these daters first scan the premises to identify potential targets – a deciding factor for whether they’ll be in the cardio or the weight section for the day. Once that’s locked upon, it’s time for ‘warm up.’ Not to be mistaken for the 10 minute sprint on the treadmill, this pre-workout practice includes a long halt around the water cooler and a quick escape to the washroom to tuck in that misplaced strand of hair.

Next up comes the tough decision of choosing the treadmill right next to your subject of interest. Not to seem over-eager, these seasoned players tactfully initiate conversation that’ll trigger their neighbors to plug out their earphones and slowen the pace of the treadmill so as to facilitate conversation. Most start with, “Is this taken?” as if they’re seating themselves for coffee. If things go as planned, they’ll be taking it to the next level in the weights section. Afterall, its the only place where ‘Arch your back and bend over for me’ won’t sound dirty.

Here’s when the serial dater starts to picture the gym floor as a dating ground. Replacing the on-call trainers, they take it upon themselves to count from from 1 – 15 for each of the set performed by the person-of-interest. Occasional correction of posture by means of physical touch is a sign of things going really well. Suddenly the scene transforms for the people involved and they linger around the machine as if its a tree in a park, long after the exercise set is over.

Gone are the days when it was found acceptable to put on your ragged t-shirts and scram for a workout. New-age gym etiquette (more like peer pressure) requires you to put on your branded gear, gel your hair, and survive a 30 minute run in a thong.

Here’s hoping that washroom queues are not the next ‘it’ spot for meeting prospective dates.