It’s that time of the year again; natural disasters and diseases hog the headlines more than political intrigue (notice the trend over the past few years); you have to update your copyright watermarks (or maybe it’s just me); you just found that long-missing piece of Christmas cake under the sofa, and it’s now home to a civilization not much older than the year.
Oh well, might as well let them live until April so that they may have a chance at an industrial civilization. Gaw’on, play God for a bit.
God tends to be remembered a lot this time of the year: Oh my god it’s a new year; oh my god I didn’t do a thing last year; oh my god I don’t know what to do this year; oh my god I might actually do something this year.
Oh my god there’s a whole year to go before the next Star Wars. Oh my god the next Spiderman comes out in a few months. Oh my god there’s no Lord of the Rings movie to look out for this year. Oh my god there just might be a sequel to Lord of the G-Strings (hubba hubba).
I’m in Mumbai this month, and I’m glad because it’s the place I call home. This time I managed to drag a crusty old laptop here with me (it barely runs Windows) so I can type at home and hopefully upload a few blog entries.
Writing in Mumbai is about as good as it gets. To be constantly drenched in stimulus might be overwhelming for an outsider, but now that I am more Mumbaikar than N.R.I. (Non-Resident Indian) with the current visa setup I find that there is a zero adaptation time when I arrive here (something that was a bit of a problem when I was younger). Ideas flow more freely here; the feverish want to write and do and create in general is much more.
Not that Dubai is any less interesting; the clash of a hundred different cultures always produces fun results, but my response to the place is a bit more muted. It takes me a week back in Dubai to get into the flow of things, to start getting ideas and images.
I’m a city boy, and Mumbai is just so much more of a city. I’m glad I’m spending all of January here, and with a laptop, a digital camera and a ton of unrealised projects it’s going to be busy busy busy. I intend to make the momentum continue through the rest of the year, and, if possible, even ramp it up back in Dubai.
Hope you have a prosperous year too, even if you aren’t in the best city on earth. God agrees with me.
And don’t touch that cake.
Vishal
