Mungaru Male

Ever since the movie, it's impossible to write those two words without using title case. Until the movie, my OCD would kick in if someone spelt the second 'm' in upper case. Now, it's the other way round!

A classic case of digression right from the word go. Darn! Why do I always do that?

So, I was standing in this bus-stop this evening, waiting for a Volvo - 201R. I saw three buses heading in the opposite direction and was confident that atleast one of them would return to take me home. Infact, I let all the buses to J B Nagar go, instead of taking one of them halfway home-ward. All in vain. Eventually, I had to take one of the JBN buses and change. 

It wasn't all too bad, though. There was a sweet, gentle breeze tickling my hair and it felt great. I looked up to see the sky all messed up, with dark and light grey clouds. It looked beautiful. Thick swirls of dark grey mixed with splashes of light grey clouds, on a sky that was another shade of grey. No sign of the sun at all. It was only 6.30PM. There was something so pleasant about the feel of the grey evening. Maybe it was still the wind. That's when I felt little droplets of water on my bare face and arms. Mungaru Male. Ah, the wonderful feeling of the early summer rains!

Then it started raining faster, bigger drops. I had to get my umbrella out to save the contents of my bag. At some point, I decided to take the JBN bus and when I got off at Thippasandra Main Road a few minutes later, the rain was pounding the streets. As I stood on the wet pavement, the hem of my trousers soaked in the soggy grime and the sound of rain on my umbrella serving as a background score to the scenes in my mind, I thought of my friends working all over the world - US, UK, Australia - and wondered how it must feel to be able to experience such diversity. 

As a kid, I always wanted to go to Europe or Australia. For some reason, US was never on my list. I had a picture of a crowded place, a big place where I could get lost and I did not want to go there. So, it didn't feel great when an astrologer read my horoscope and said I'd move permanently to the US. Did he know that I would go to the United States or did he just mean that I would move to any country outside India (in those days, US was the most popular)? Since I don't believe in astrology, I never bothered to find out, so that's a question I'll probably never hear answers to.

Then I looked around me and noticed how dark it was! Why does it get dark so early when it rains? Everything was so wet and dark. Normally, that would make me feel gloomy. Today it all felt nice. I loved the flashes of light, the breeze, the wetness... I stood at the various bus-stops, waiting for buses, for over an hour and all I felt was good good good. Great, in fact! That's the magic of Mungaru Male, I guess. It cooled my spirit. 

At the earliest signs of the rain reducing, I slipped off my umbrella. Took a bus to LRDE and walked home with a spring in my heart. The infamous power cuts had rendered the area completely dark but my mind was so uncluttered this evening that even the darkness of the night made me smile. It was as if someone had swept off cobwebs from inside my head and vacuum-ed the place. I come home to find that my mum has neatened up my house. Less clutter. Brighter interiors. Cleaner air. Bloody hell! Today was a day of nice-ness! 

Mungaru Male. I simply love it!