#mkwriteups

I have been thinking about you, you are special to me. Even though you don't really know me but we do connect somewhere in this beautiful world with all the love that profoundly showers upon us and some of you may recollect your delightful love story. My love story. The story that turned me into a virtual sanyasi. Ha. I wish there were one. Just one. But there are so many. Of how frequently love has found me and how often have I lost it.

Love first found me in the neighborhood. It lived next door. I was 6. She was 5. Her name... I don’t even remember now. Ammulu was what her mum called. All I remember is that I wanted to marry her. We’d sarcastically marry so many times, circling a coconut husk lantern seven times chanting the mantra "Om Mangalyam tantunanena Om". Once, when mum was in the kitchen, I played the melody Pehla Pyaar Hai from the film Hum Aapke Hain Kaun on the tape-recorder and attempted to imitate the sheepish romance of Salman Khan where he lifts Madhuri up in his arms from the car’s bonnet. Our wooden couch turned into a makeshift car, as I lifted her at the precise moment in the song. Just before I could have given a kiss on Ammulu’s cheek (that’s what they taught us in Bollywood!), my mum caught hold of us and pulled my ears. Signs of warnings were given. Neighborhood romance: strictly prohibited. And also no to Bollywood movies as an inspiration for love. A piece of advice I had to follow to this day. And next Rakhi, our mothers made her tie a rakhi to me. End of story.

Love found me once again when I was in grade 5. I was 10. Her name was Parimala. She was in the same school, the daughter of our English teacher Sunitha Ma’am. She spoke flawless English, similar to the speed of a rocket, and astonishingly, every time she spoke with her mother, it was in English too. Wow. I felt so green with envy and inwardly cursed my parents for being educated in the Hindi medium and poke fun at me every time I tried to talk in English with them. Bada angrez ho Gaya hai, beta. My child has become quite an Englishman, they would say. I underwent a severe inferiority complex because of Pari, but soon the complex turned into reverence. She once spoke to me, in English and after she discovered that I was not too confident, she switched to Hindi. She made me feel very comfortable. I felt possibly this is love: one who cares to cause you to feel great. One day in the class, I heard that Pari has left school. Her parents are going through a divorce. I wondered why would someone want to leave Pari’s mother, Sunitha Ma’am when she spoke such good English. Must be somebody who wouldn't be comfortable with her.

Love found me once again in grade 8, in my best friend Akshay. No, I wasn’t fascinated by him but I truly cared for him. I could die for him. I would complete his pending notes, bring extra food for him for lunch. He told me that love and friendship is about loyalty. Unconditional loyalty. Once, he stole something from our classmate Deepika’s bag. I helped him steal it, by guarding our classroom door during lunch when everyone was away. When Deepika, in tears, complained to the class teacher that her new pencil box was missing, Akshay snuck it in my bag. The teacher ordered: “Who has stolen it, stand up now, else Principal will summon.” Akshay prodded me to prove my loyalty. I stood up, received deadly beatings but felt so proud. I looked at Akshay and he gave me a smug smile. I had passed his test. I had found his approval. Maybe love is approval. When he stole again, I didn’t support him. I didn’t feel like it. I had shown my loyalty once. The thrill of being appreciated was gone. When the outcry about this stealing happened, Akshay, as usual, shoved his find into my bag. I stood up again, this time to point at Akshay. He’s the thief, I said. I lost my friend, but I had lost my care for him the last time itself. The moment his approval arrived. Love succeeds when there’s no gradient of power when there’s no need for approval. Or else, the awe & the fascination goes for a toss the moment love happens.

Love found me again in grade 11, like how it finds a nerd, in plus two Chemistry practical classes. A new student had her roll number adjacent to mine and we were unfortunately paired for conducting the practical together. She was a studious girl. I developed a feeble crush. A sterling crush that grew with every chemical reaction that would happen in front of us. I thought maybe studying intensely would impress her. I topped the exams, and, scored the highest, but she would never engage in a heart-to-heart. Before the year ended, the writer in me thought I would write, not tell. We would use a pipette to suck Copper Sulphate solution and right after every suckle, we should hand it over to the next who washed the pipette before using. At the point when she gave me the pipette, I didn’t wash, as if conveying that I didn’t mind her saliva. She hardly noticed the subtlety. She has graduated in engineering post-school while I became the so-called subtle writer. Four years later, I have asked her out, subtly. She still thinks it’s a joke. Last month, she got married. I received an invitation — a subtle joke on me.

There was this one particular love that really went beyond all these. The one in which I was immensely loved back. Profusely, passionately, with no limitation. Not for weeks, or months but years though. The one where you’re loved just so much that when love ends, you don’t even know if and how to live anymore. The one where you believe everything will be just alright only if you’re with the person but the person stops feeling that way as time passes all the way. The one where love stays with one foot out, and eager to wear shoes, and run out as soon as the opportunity presents itself. And then one day, it does so. After crying high, you accept. You let the love go, you set it free for yourselves. Only to find out that it doesn’t really want to leave you, it never wanted to, it just wanted to let go of your hold because your hold was so suffocating it. Now it’s free, free not from you, but free to love you like the way it wants to get back. You find it hard to accept. It’s easier to accept departure than accepting the return in a way, especially when it’s not returning to you the way you want. But you have no choice. You have started loving this free body that your love has become, like just floating in space; loving you in ways, and you didn’t know it could, loving you in ways you didn’t think you deserved them. It’s a cosmic shower and moreover, no need for an umbrella.

The above love stories are fun and kind of adorable in light of the fact that, in all these, there was never a time when someone loved too much — neither I nor did others. Eventually, No hearts were broken; no animals were hurt. It was driven not certainly by love but either the need for approval, a childlike curiosity for intimacy, or just too shy (or too nerdy) a desire to make them notice me. These loves make for good coffee table gossip, or for your grandchildren's bedtime tale, but would rarely seep into a novel or a long heartfelt poem. There was a heart clearly, but there was no hurt in these. There was something different, a hurt that made me a writer.

Relentlessly, It makes you feel in control. It makes you feel you understand love. But you don’t yet know if it makes you feel loved. Does it? You think and figure it’s easier to be a virtual sanyasi than to be loved.

Thank you for reading,

Regards,

Mukesh Kumar

I have been living at the place of coalitiō's co-founders for the past three months. Now, I believe it's time for me to find a place that I can call my own. Finding a house in Hyderabad isn't like walking in a supermarket to buy a shampoo. That is hard but finding a house is harder. More than options you have obstacles. I'd like an option of a balcony for my plants and like to be visited by birds but here balconies are a luxury, it is hard to even find a washroom that has a working shower. It was an entirely fresh experience for me to research on this great city.

The city is divided into old, new, and contemporary Hyderabad. The old one is where Mughals have built a Charminar and a lot of emporiums which is located at a place called Laadbazar. Then there's the new one where India's millennials reside. IT Parks, coalitiō Headquarters is somewhere in between, a place you stop by to shop or party or experience art.

Every area has its variables like budget or your gender but they all have one thing in common, they hate bachelors. Only PG (Paying Guests) owners absolutely love cramping bachelors in a small room and overcharging them. The mattresses in PGs are not tall-people friendly but the food is cockroach friendly.

If you are a woman, you pay extra for the pseudo-security. I hear my fellow female colleague moving from PG to PG with the hope of finding a place that has a reasonable curfew time and a Wi-Fi that doesn't just exist for namesake.

I have walked from area to area on foot. From Paradise circle to Hyderabad Public School, Begumpet. Searching for something that will fit in my budget and not make me feel claustrophobic but I haven't been able to find any such place. All that I have found is prejudice. My religion, my relationship status, my gender, my caste, and my food preferences matter more than whether I can pay the rent on time or not.

Websites like Waste away or 99problems are not helping either. They are everything your parents warned you about the internet. Nevertheless, food delivery apps such as Swiggy, or Uber Eats are lost in maps to find locations towards me and the house hunting with running rats in your stomach is much worse than ever imagined.

Hyderabad is a great place to live if you own a house and a vehicle. It is neither middle-class friendly nor introvert-friendly (unless you are rich). You have to compromise in one way or another. Live next to a graveyard or a noisy bridge or open sewage or stay on the fifth floor without a lift or just live in a society where you can't wear shorts outside or cook non-veg. I believe the only house hunting hack to take care of in Hyderabad is making sure your home is walking distance from the office, otherwise, you know what the infamous Hyderabad traffic does to you.

Finding a house is like finding the right sized shoe or as my female colleague says the right sized bra. But mental comfort is not affordable in Hyderabad. If you have found a good place it is probably in the suburbs like Madhapur or L.B.Nagar. Living in these areas means giving away half of my earnings to Metro or Ola or just the petrol pump.

The only good thing about the city is its weather, which is pleasant but it is deteriorating. It will soon run out of water. It is already the victim of climate change. Ultimately, Oyo or Goibibo have lifted up their rules and regulations to check in to the rooms. And while I want to do my part to save this city, I can't even save a spot where I can rest my feet at night.

A lot about our experience in a city, especially a new city that we have recently moved to, is decided by the house we live in. Cities can be scarred in your mind if the house you rent ends up giving you water, electricity, or landlord trouble. The quintessence of a home is the beholder of peace. If I have to define my home, it will be the place where I put my head to sleep every night. If a home doesn't provide me peace, I won't be able to sleep and the house misses its most basic characteristic. One part, of course, is hunting the right house, the other part mostly is what we get acquainted with only after we move. Neighbors, I leave most neighbors for some other letter, but I seriously hope you are happy and able to sleep at peace in the house you live in. Only then should you consider calling it home.

I'm sure we all have had terrible house-hunting experiences. But few end up living in private hostels, even though you need to adjust with your unfavorite food served to you. This rebuke phase we have all encountered at least once in our lifetime. When it comes on my part to suffer under the hot sun on foot to hunt for a house in each and every street is an unbearable experience to carry along. Finally, after an exhausting day, I rested myself sitting next to an old dargah and pinged to my co-founders to convince them to tolerate me for few more days to live in with them otherwise I'll curse I mentioned. And guess what, my house-hunting turned up into a new job-hunting.

Thank you for reading,

Regards,

Mukesh Kumar