Love in a Time of Malaria

Romantic love is wholly overrated. It brings nothing but pain and suffering in the end. Therefore, I, from this day forward, will dedicate all my affection to the great city of Calcutta, or Kolkata to be politically correct. I spent the last month and a half there and had the time of my life. Rolls from Badshah, shingaras from Bancharam, Deviled Crab at Mocambo, chaa and adda with friends, paan masala hookah at Urban Desi, I was in heaven. Now I'm back on Earth and not enjoying it.

Going to Calcutta somehow makes me realize things about myself. For example, I'm a true Bengali at heart. I like rice and laziness and like to sit around and ponder the meaning of life and pretend to come to some epiphany and write about it in my inconsequential blog. I realized that I don't absolutely abhor the idea of living in India. I am incapable of separating emotions from intimacy and if I try, it'll come out in the form of constant gushing of tears for four hours. I realized that first love, no matter how hard you try to cover it up, never goes away. I also realized that I like to complicate situations more than necessary in my head, and the person I'm miserably awake cause of at this hour despite being unwell will never love me.

So I may not have written that novel I meant to on my trip, but I did do a fair bit of soul searching and some of the results might actually help me. My New Years resolution: not complicate situations and go with the flow. And flowing along I will be till I can make another visit to the City of Joy, because after all, Park Ave's got nothing on Park Street.