New Roommates

By the beginning of December, tourists started coming to Morjim in pretty good numbers. Soon we got two new roommates. One was an Australian woman called Emma. She was in Goa to learn yoga. Madhu was happy as she got some woman to talk. They both would be found talking throughout the day on some or another subject. Looking at them, I would wonder how women talk so much? Even god was clueless in understanding women, whereas I was only a mortal. Our other roommate was a young Israeli boy who came backpacking India just after finishing his 3 years of military service. When he first time introduced himself, we were left in stitches. His name was Yoni. I couldn't believe he came to India with that name dreaming to have a good time. When we told him the meaning of his name in Hindi, he was disturbingly shocked. Then he told us how he understood now that why people would laugh when he would introduce himself to them. He was sitting holding his head down, maybe cursing his parents for keeping such a name, while we were laughing our heart out carelessly at what that young mind was going through. We were mean.

Yoni was an Osho sanyasi, and every sanyasi would get a spiritual name. His was Swayam. Indeed a beautiful name, just like his original one. We preferred to call him Swayam so that way we could take him seriously. He was a Dj and all about hippie life. His dreadlocks and tattoos justified his passion. Travelling all alone with a plan of staying in India for 1 year defined courage in that young boy. He wanted to travel the whole of India on a bike, but he hadn't learnt how to drive a bike. So I volunteered to help him learn how to drive. I had already taken a scooty on rent to travel around. I would still call that a bike to mask the male ego. There was a big ground nearby full of reddish soil. That was the perfect place to teach bike driving. Every evening we would go there and practice for 1-hour doing many rounds of that ground. I would hold Yoni from behind......... I mean hold Swayam from behind. Now you see why we preferred to call him by the latter name. Well, to sum up, he learnt to drive a bike in less than one month.

Soon the backpackers started flooding in Morjim. Sometimes I would get stunned looking at those 20-year-old backpackers from different countries. They would be full of life, eager to explore the foreign land on their own, and having a strong faith in diving into the unknown. I was nothing like that when I was 20. I was a frog in the small pond, struggling to speak in English while roaming around in Pune. It felt like my 20s were extremely unproductive and underdeveloped. Sometimes I would meet someone so amazing who had travelled the world, had been blessed with rich experiences and always had great stories to share. That would make me feel little of myself as I had done nothing significant in life. I would sit with a blank mind in social conversations, thinking that I have no story to share. That self-limiting belief got shattered only when I started writing my stories. No matter how fun, interesting, boring or senseless the stories were, they were my stories. We all have unique stories, irrespective of what kind of life we were living. Until we would find pride, love, worth and belief in our stories, they would remain hidden in the basement of our doubtful mind.

Life Happens Above The Basement.