Yeh hai Mumbai, Meri Jaan...

I have been traversing through India for a week now, and it feels like a bit longer; considering the cities and flavours that I have delighted in, in this short space of time... We landed in Mumbai a week ago, in transit to Jaipur, the famed and imaginative 'pink city' of royal fantasy. After gleeful visits to Amber Fort and the treasures of the old city around the City Palace and the glorious Hawa Mahal, the visions of the puppet shows continue to remain as trinkets in my mind (I have a pair souvenir dolls -male&female- to remind me! hmm, just like in that movie.. what was it again..)

The celebration of pinks moved on to deeper shades of colour as we made our way through Rajasthan... onward to Agra, with the incredulous stop at Fatehpur Sikhri, famed for its sprawling palaces and mausoleums. The palace of Queen Jodha, the towering five-storeyed Paanch Mahal, the Diwan-e-Khaas that undoubtedly houses many secrets in his innately carved walls... the Hall of Mirrors... myriad fantasies come to mind in making my way along the paths and through the hallowed arches, and beside the now deteriorating pillars that form the structure of some 46 palaces here...

Agra, filled me. The joy spilled pearls uncounted through my eyes. Its been seven years since I visited the Taj Mahal. Seven is a lucky number? It just occured to me that it might be. Who knows. The Taj is mesmerizing as ever. I am spellbound still. Maybe it means a different thing to me now than it might have back then. But its a good difference. I conversed with those walls of milk and honey. They smiled at me. Mostly for being silly. Mosly for my strange state of self-denial. Mostly for my unwarranted contradictory state of being. I wanted to place what I thought was a burden, at its feet. Too much drama ensued. Have you ever seen the Taj Mahal, in all its majesty, break down into a fit of giggles? It did. And what a beautiful sight that was. Sigh. And then onward to Delhi. Bustling, rumbling Delhi. The grandest rajhdhani. Where I usually delight in the wares of booksellers. But I ventured to nurse a bit of fever and some well-known delhi belly. Souvenirs, no doubt.

Having arrived in Mumbai just last night, I must look somewhat in a trance state; dazed as I am from the happenings of the last week or so. And then, of course, is this something special about actually being back in Mumbai... because there is something that draws me back here, time and again. Something, that links the energy untapped within me, to the immense energy that resonates through this place of many contraditory things. Perhaps it is that it is intensely beautiful in its tragic state, a contradiction in itself. Or that it is so often misunderstood, misused by its custodians and so out-of-reach of its essential benefactors...
So many whats and ifs... and yet the city thrives because of and in spite of it all... immensely alive with creative energy, life, and all things magical. I am here to reconnect. My soul is thirsting and quenching almost at the speed it would take to fumble through the beads of my tasbeeh.. Greatful, and joyfilled and somewhat in acknowledgement of the inner chaos.

Ru-ba-ru Roshni se... Finally face2face with Sunshine. The tears flow freely now.

With Love and Magic
Shafs