Wake Up Sid

I cannot believe it is the movie Wake Up Sid that has finally made me to start blogging!! I saw this movie today. Just by myself and with about 30 other strangers for company in a Ahmedabad multiplex. The movie was nice, but what inspired me to start blogging was the nostalgia it stirred in me for those 2 years I spent in Bombay (and I cannot say mumbai despite resolving to call madras as chennai!!).

There is a scene where konkana says to ranbir - if this was to be my last night in bombay and there was only one spot you can show me, what would that be? - the minute she finished saying this, the words 'Marine Drive' splashed through my mind... and there they were in the next shot :)

Seeing them both sitting there reminded me so much of my friend Shilpa and myself and the times we have spent sitting on those ledges. Shilpa is from Delhi and have never had the experience of the sea until she came to Bombay. I am from Chennai and the sea has been an integral part of my growing up days. For both of us, sitting on those ledges in marine drive, listening and watching the sea crash against those rocks was an incredible experience. It always made us pause from our busy lives of mails, deadlines, ambitions, performance, career growth and realise the joy in simple things... this is what we loved best at those moments.

I worked at Bakthawar in Nariman Point for couple of months. I used to take the train from Andheri to Churchgate. From the station, there is a taxi stand where you stand in a queue (seperate for men and women) to take a shared taxi of four for Rs.6.50 each to specific office locations in that area. There is an order in which you sit in the taxi. The first person in the queue sits in the front next to the driver. The second person takes the right most seat behind the driver, the third is in the middle and the last person sits on the left corner. Usually people prefer to be first since you can sit separately and don't have to squeeze with others. But I always loved being second, as then, during the drive you have the sea on your right and it was sheer joy having the sea breeze drift over your face in the morning. For that one pleasure it was worth coming home very late the previous night, starting early in the morning, facing demanding associates, taking the work load and again reaching home late that day. Those mornings were definitely worth all of this...

Konkana opens the window of her flat and falls in love with the view. That reminded me so much of my flat in sion (where I stayed for a year with my school-mate Harini). This flat was in the kalpataru building which was a sky scrapper and we were on the 10th floor. The view from our window was incredible. I cannot count the number of lazy saturday and sunday mornings I have spent sitting on my window sil with a coffee mug or a book and staring at the beautiful and never ending bombay skyline...

There were so many other scenes in the movie that reminded me of many more such things. What topped it all, however, was the last part in the movie. Konkana says that what made bombay special for her was that she had a friend to share it all with and she would not have enjoyed it if that person had not been there. It was this that inspired me to write this post...

For what would have my life been without my friends with me there. What made each of my experiences special was always having people with me to share it with and that multiplied the joy from those moments. Sitting alone in that theater, I could not but agree emphatically with konakana...