Japanese Professor

I'm watching my Japanese professor teach. He has put so much effort into this class. He knows exactly what to say and when to change slides.

He is holding a make-up lesson at 7pm on a Saturday, yet at least 50% of his students have turned up. The clicker that he uses to point at the slides and change them is faulty today; he pushes it twice, while talking about the impact of hurricanes on wages, but the slide doesn't change. He pushes harder, stalling with words, and it still doesn't work. Then finally, it does - before conking again. He half-laughs and shakes his head in clear unbridled frustration.

This happens so many times that he finally, just short of cursing, mutters to the class - I am not blaming you, I am just really ..

It works, and he swiftly changes the function of the device from clicker to laser.

Before conking again.

His frustration is mounting. He goes a little red and grits his teeth a little. He sighs and glances at the digital clock on the wall. Does anyone have any questions? he stalls. Comments? You two, seem to be chatting a bit, anything you want to add? Anyone else?

His hair starts standing straighter as he pushes the button harder and harder. Slowly his face goes red, then redder, until he is a tomato headed Japanese man comically posed, pressing a button faster and faster until it's a blur, and finally he bursts with a pop.

A squeak from the spot where he popped - Ok, take a break for seventeen and a half minutes!

Wanderlust Dust

St. Gallen

A Naive Travelogue

I arrived alone at the little Swiss town of St.Gallen. Loaded with a suitcase that weighed as much as I did, and armed with a laptop as well as a couple of handbags, I stood blinking in the scarce yet warm May sun outside the railway station, gleefully soaking in the success of arriving. I remember feeling like this was how all beginnings should feel - exciting, unfamiliar, and waiting to be conquered.

Not completely oblivious to the extreme German atmosphere around me - faces, signs, phrases, even the coughs and sneezes - I looked around trying to figure out how to get a ride to my new address. I managed to get a cab (which I was to discover overnight was the most expensive way of getting around) and was driven to what was to be my home for the following month. After a detour to the university so I could register myself and collect my keys, I tumbled out of the cab onto the pavement at 44, Roschacherstrasse.

In a pile of limbs and luggage and a puff of smoke and dust, I stood looking up at the five storey building as my friendly non-English speaking lady cab driver zoomed off, leaving me with a slight pit in my stomach. This building had no lifts, and I had to get up 125 stairs, rounding a corner at every 25 stairs, with a landing at every 50. It took me a couple of minutes to realize that looking at my luggage then at the building over and over was not going to get me anywhere. So I grinned at myself as convincingly as I could, and launched myself at the building door.

It was much warmer inside. I barely managed to slip my mammoth 4 foot by 5 foot by 4 foot suitcase in when the door slammed behind me. And then, I began what I still recall as the one of the most excruciating climb upwards on stairs. It was like carrying a second human being - another me - up the stairs, and I weighed 50 kgs. It took me 45 minutes to get all my stuff up. I sat outside the door, panting, heaving, feeling like all the contents of my chest would spill out of my body and go tumbling down 5 storeys. Not wanting to climb down again to retrieve them, I sat balled up, trying to catch my breath. My rasping echoed unashamedly throughout the corridors. It slowed down after about five minutes, and finally stopped. With one more deep breath and my heart still pounding, I went into the apartment.

It was huge. There were 7 large bedrooms, a kitchen, a hall, two washrooms, and a laundry area. I went into the first room, and I was in love. It was furnished, but that wasn't the basis for my shallow love - the view was breathtaking. I could see green meadows on hills, the roofs of old buildings and homes, the clock towers of a couple of churches, and the never ending sky. I sat, tired, happy, probably jet lagged, and connected to the internet to inform my family that I was safe.

St. Gallen

Then I began exploring. Barefoot, I peered into nooks and crannies, cleaned, rearranged,

mused, re-rearranged. My body had adjusted to the temperature by then and I realized it was colder than I thought. It was also 2pm, which meant stores would all be shut within three hours. I began setting up my room, admiring and frowning and holding at arm's length the relics left behind by the previous tenants, all the while glancing whimsically at the orange curtains that filtered tilted sunlight into my room.

The floor rumbled. I paused, then continued setting up. It rumbled again. The third time, I realized that the buses passing on the road were causing the rumbling in the very foundation of the building. This feeling of the floor vibrating momentarily was to become a familiar sensation that I began to associate with the warmth and comfort of that apartment, rather than something scary and tremulous.

I decided to step out and get some food. I didn't want to wait for the others to arrive because it could be pretty late by the time they did, and I was too hungry anyway. With keys, some cash and a cell phone, I stepped out of the building without a map. It was far easier going down all those stairs. But as I did, I wondered at myself and how I managed to drag all that weight up. These stairs were ultimately a majority of the exercise I did whilst sampling all the breads and cheeses ever made on earth.

Out in the chill, I began walking aimlessly. Aimlessness is delightful. I knew my address, and I didn't want to know any more - I was eager to lose myself in this new place. And so I walked, and walked, and walked until I was certain I was quite lost. I wandered into a grocery store - Coop - and picked up bread, milk, cheese, yogurt; the other grocery store was Migros, which was a lot cheaper, and I eventually shopped there. Here, I befriended a nice Italian shopkeeper who helped me choose the best basil leaves from the selection. And then, at my 6th attempt at finding an electronic store, I discovered "M-Electronics" where I bought a converter plug to charge my laptop. I thought I was set.

I strolled through the streets, back streets, shops, lanes - and since I had gone through them once, my brain had absorbed as much as it could about the new environment. It was hard to stay lost once I had already landmarked familiar areas, although I didn't know it while I was doing it.

Marktplatz, or Marketplace, is situated more or less at the heart of St.Gallen. It is an arrangement of chocolateries, bakeries, wine and cheese stores, cafes and homemade on-the-go baked food stalls. Then there are a couple of large malls too, with branded goods, electronics, organic fruits and vegetables, flower shops, and the usual. Scattered among these are restaurants - ranging from bratwurst stalls to authentic Mexican, American, Turkish Italian restaurants, and combinations of the three. I walked through it, back to 44 Roschacherstrasse, feeling that lovely combination of air-chill and warm-rays on my skin. It tingled happily.

I fumbled with the keys and pushed through the glass door that had slammed loudly behind me a few hours ago. I carried my grocery bags up those 125 stairs, beginning to like the familiar smell of basil and tomatoes that came from the house on the third floor. I'd always linger on that landing a moment longer before climbing further. It was like a milestone, and a pleasant (and much needed) resting stop. I went into the apartment and locked it from the inside. After setting my grocery bags on the kitchen table, I went to my room, stood in front of the mirror, and looked myself square in the eye. I was tired, but satisfied - no, happily satisfied. It was 8pm, and the sun was just beginning its journey down.

There is a particular angle of the sun's rays, and it invites a pensive bird call - a chirp that sounds decidedly uttered towards a single, specific direction. When this angle of the sun's rays falls in my vicinity, then no matter where I am, I feel like I know everything there is to know. And this was one of those moments. I laughed at my naïveté then, and I laugh at it now. All I had achieved so far was a few pine cones from my long walk and a vague Italian shopkeeper-friend. Yet I was invincible even against myself and there was so much more to see, to learn, to do, before I could consider myself a contributor in any way to the world we live in.

I distinctly remember feeling, knowing - in that small moment, in a small city, being a small person, that I could do anything.

Interlaken

I'm a Tourist in my City

This time, I don't feel like I owe my reader an apology for using a cliché in my title. Because clichés are good at expressing a collective repetitive feeling and they deserve credit for never holding a grudge for being used, overused or misused.

I can't count how many times in the past three years I have passed a tourist - denim shorts, branded shades, big backpack, camera, wisps of hair left to the mercy of wind or heat, and partially scrunched up eyebrows. And of course, the quintessential big map blowing in the wind, hastily folded and unfolded and stuffed into a back pocket over a hundred times. When they stop to ask me for directions, I realize two things - one, I look like I belong to this strange place and am approachable for this reason when directions are needed; and two, I almost always know exactly what path they need to take to reach their destination. Then we smile and wave goodbye, and I continue walking in the real world, while they explore the island excitedly for a few more days, and then go home to some other country, far away.

I can't count how many times in the past three years I have passed a tourist and wished I was him or her, without a real-world care, here only long enough to fall in love with the good side of Singapore and appreciate it's beauty - but not long enough to find out the things they hate, the things that are ugly and just as real.

Even though things have changed for me on this tropical island, and even though I now like leaving my wisps of hair for the wind to blow or sweat to cling to, I'm only just starting to call it home. Because there's a sense of freedom, choices, responsibilities - all the things that a tourist is limited to by virtue of the amount of time he or she can spend here.

But the last time I flew home and had to fill out an immigration card, my pen lingered just a moment longer than usual over the words "Country of Residence". They seemed to be raising an eyebrow at me, not mocking, but half-curious, waiting for me to write an answer so they could be stamped by an Immigrations officer and filed away forever.

Of course I still wrote India.

An Undaunted City

The city rages on, undaunted by last night's furious rain.

That rain pelted on my windows last night like countless tiny fists begging for sanctuary.

Those fists are tired now, they are pelting lightly on the same window panes, only rapping lightly with weak knuckles.

I nearly opened my window just to let them in and rest.

But that would have meant welcoming the howling wind inside as well.

And the wind was just a haunting menace that wouldn't let me sleep.

So I left half the window open and some grateful drops sprayed in, while the rest tumbled towards the ground and ended their miserable fall.

As I look out at the city, it rages on, nothing is changing on the ground as everything is changing in the sky.