The other side of resilience!

Everybody nowadays is hailing the never-say-die spirit of Mumbai and Mumbaikars. The city’s ability to bounce back from tragedies is being eulogized about and the citizens are being praised to the skies for the admirable way in which they helped each other that fatal night. Now don’t get me wrong, I am a big fan of Mumbai and Mumbaikars. I too agree wholeheartedly that the city’s indomitable spirit is to be admired and respected. But amongst all that respect and admiration is a twinge of uncertainty. Call it cynicism if you will, and I am a self professed cynic, but I think this bouncing-back-from-tragedies characteristic is a bit worrisome. What may be construed as indestructibility might just be that the city is getting used to tragedies and is simply too tired to fight back. So life goes on as usual. Praise for helping each other, might just be a lack of faith in basic humanity. So that when people actually do something naturally human, they are praised as messiahs.

I love this city. I think it is a great place to be in. But I also believe that a show of too much strength is not good. Not for an individual, not for a city. One has at times to break down and weep. For the people, for the loss, for their city. Me believes that real strength lies in breaking down and building again when something cracks, not acknowledging that crack, is denial not strength.

Mumbai is a strong city and it will always remain so… but today I think its time that we stopped praising Mumbai for not crying and lend it a shoulder instead. Maybe its time we stopped thinking about its ability to bounce back from tragedies and ensure that those tragedies don’t occur again. Maybe its time we stop a minute to mourn instead of carrying on life as usual again.

The world is getting smaller!!

Or so I have heard. But the way I see it, a smaller world has caused people to grow distant from one another. A long long time ago when people still used to use the pen and paper, a lot of you young uns were not around then, staying in touch with people was a tough job. You had to write letter, stamp them, post them and then wait for ages to get an answer. Admittedly I frequently forgot to stamp or post the letter, but the point is staying in touch took an effort which people willingly took. The letters were full of titbits about one’s daily life and frequently had lots of details that friends were probably not interested in. But courtesy those letters, at least the ones which were posted, people knew what was happening in each other’s lives. A flash forward to today and you have an inbox that is full of messages from your friends. But alas! They are all forwards, some which are hilarious, some which are interesting and others which are just plain dumb. But hey your friend has remembered you and now you can respond instantly. So what do you do? You send them another forward which yet another friend has sent you and yipeeee! You are in touch with all your friends. Unfortunately you still have no idea what is happening in their lives.

And then of course you have the gods of internet, Yahoo and msn, who provide you with messengers that enable you to chat instantly with your friends. Unfortunately they come with busy and BRB icons that always make you reluctant to buzz in case your friend is really busy. Of course since u cant see who u r actually chatting with, you might end up sending a particularly insulting message to ur friend’s dad, mom, girlfriend who had just switched on the comp. Believe me guys that is an embarrassing situation.

And then again see how the world of art and music have been affected by this
world-come-closer-thingie. Earlier we had songs of kabootars talking chiiti’s to beloveds. Now what do you do? “msn ja ja ja pehle pyar ka pehla chat…. “ or maybe a “sms aaya hai aaya hai sms aaya hai”???? See doesn’t have the same ring to it does it???

Well I know I am just plain blabbering now so am gonna stop. But please if any of my friends who I am “in touch with” happen to read this. Send me a letter or two. And even if u forget to put the stamp on.. it will be quite oke with me. You will get my response the same day… through e-mail.