Page 50 - You Only Live Once [BooksLD]

Rainfall ignites a flame in every soul. A singer is no exception. Children
jump with joy, thrill, and go berserk in the rains. Rains lift us with joy, with
energy.

I scribble in my diary:

Heaven is white
only in fiction.

It is certainly blue
and green in reality.

What’s your drug?
Mine is the sea, rains.

What’s your drug?
Or the mountains.

Heaven is white only in fiction. It’s certainly blue and green in reality.
And when you feel so, you don’t really have to die to reach heaven. You
can do so while you’re still alive. Life is uncertain. But death is certain and

no matter what you do, it will meet you someday, somewhere. What
happens after death is a complete mystery. So live life to the fullest and visit
heaven more often.

Next morning, the first thing I try out is a ‘cutting chai’, as they call it in
India. A group of singers enter the compartment. They’re all dressed up in
intricate cotton lehengas and dhotis. Women are adorned in black metal
jewellery and have designs made out of bindi -like dots across their face.
They also have on white bangles broad enough to fully cover their wrists
and partially even their arms.

They play instruments that are perhaps indigenous to the Indian
subcontinent. They sing in their melodious voices. I’m a Bollywood fan so I
have never had issues understanding Hindi. Dad made sure I also learnt
speaking Hindi, my mother tongue. There’s an inexplicable feeling about
getting under the skin of a culture.

As I listen to them play Udd Jaa Kaale Kaawa , I feel the grief of
separation flow in my veins. They are some traditional folk performers and
I barely know them. But aren’t we all the same? Yes, we are! The core of us
is all emotions, feelings, and experiences. How we look or where we come
from might differ, yet we’re all the same. Humans are all the same. We’re