nothing like the rains to make a beginning.

i had landed in bombay on one such wet morning. and this monsoon, clouded dark seems right to bring to mind the long lost rains.

the wet smell of the earth mixed up with the first flush of freedom. the fear, the soaring giddiness, the dreams that seemed to near to catch. everything left behind to be made sense of by everything i had come in search for..

wading through knee deep water boarding the half empty bus from khar to versova..the one image that became bombay to me was the irrepressible smile on a wet face..struggling to get on to the bus, everything drowning in that rain that seemed to have no end…and yet that smile, that had no grouse in it..no regret..just an acceptance with open arms..

that was my first memory of bombay.

the first impression to be followed later by many ebbs and flows. i’ve always felt bombay is like the sea. it gives and takes, gives back some more and then takes it all. pulls you in and pushes you away. you try hard to hold on but the sand just slips away from grasp..

seven years now. seems long enough to now set roots in this sandy terrain.