Home is where - the boots are/ heart is/both the above/ none of the above

I was recently reading an excerpt of William Dalrymple’s The Last Mughal, a book I am slightly hesitant to pick up because of (a) the size of the book (b) the price of the book and (c) the general wariness I have against authors who write about my home. Somehow, like all of us, they try to understand what is going on, and very very rarely can they avoid some major faux pas, something that wrecks it all – the investment of time and money and mental space, all go down the drain. I think I am being harsh, but I just do not have time to read other people’s prejudices about something I carry around in my mind. I love Delhi and I somehow don’t expect anyone else to. I can see why you wouldn’t. I do enjoy the excessive smells and the sounds of the place, the fact that I am familiar with the veins of the city, that I can use the utterly dependable and cheap bus service, with a distinctly unique flavour which makes it rather unfriendly for people who do not have a clue.

That is not to say that I do not love other places, I do feel quite equally at home. It is weird that tho I do feel at home in some 3 cities at least, 3 cities that have generally treated me with much love and where I have been simply been involved in the business of living not site-seeing. I cannot find a good reason to travel, and I have been looking for a reason for a couple of months. The past book which I read, Paul Sinclair’s Murray and then again the excerpt that I read just brings up the layers and layers and layers that city can have. That you can live there all of your life and yet be blind to the most beautiful aspects of it, the most significant aspects of it. I have a massive distrust of tourism brochures which I have found to be telling blatant lies out of sheer malice, stupidity or difficulty.

I do not believe in being part of the furniture either, the most un-questioning way of living your life based on the general social norms. Ah and what social norms are we talking about here, they depend simply on the group you belong to. Conflicts arise where none should be, like the presenter of a wonderful wonderful black comedy on radio claimed, “There is no one held in as much contempt as an aboriginal who can speak English.” Does it matter if you are held in comtempt? Is it just one of those we tend to take personally when it isn’t? That there is no one anywhere who ‘belongs’ and there is no substitute to human kindness. And human kindness can get past the barrier of cultures, cannot it?