Apathetic. Review on Patna, India (PAT) - Patna Airport

A large dusty man in a small dusty world.

I have been extremely busy. Surreptitiously occupied with the single-most practised profession of busy mankind. Lying comfortably perched on the b*utt with nothing at all to do. For the linguistically minded I could flash an oft used but little understood word- laziness. On second thoughts, make that the second most practised profession. The first one would be boredom(Aw come on, I CAN do two jobs at a time. I AM a hard working soul. Just takes time to get down to the body!).

I am back in Patna after almost a year, long hair, unshaved stubble, and a burgeoning home belly. I have a plethora of clothes which are white at home, lighter shades and all. I never take them out coz it's too much trouble to take them out. On one of those hot afternoons when my mind wasn't quite working right, I had bought this faint blue jeans, which keeps the other whites company in my cupboard at home. So when at home, I am usually this clown wearing whites mostly, and the sole black running shoes(on which incidentally, I have never run), walking around like a completely different character in a completely different era movie. Not that I have grown tall in the past year. Just seems odd that it is perhaps the first time that I am realizing as if I have stepped into lilliput. The average bihari is some seemingly four foot(Before you start biting, I said the words, seemingly, and average, so shhhh!). The houses all ghastly reproductions of bricks put together in whichever way they want to grow or jut out. In Patna, nothing is ever repaired, repainted, or cleaned. It is just left to rot, and peel away, because the people feel that existing is reason enough to be thankful to the lord and mighty. The rest of the loot can be stashed up when they are mummified.

There is a complete lack of aesthetics in either the architecture or the tongue, so much as it appears as if the people take pride in their uncouthness. My father's famous reaction to my trying umpteen times to tell him how to use email has been ''Wo mouse touse mujhse nahi hoga. Wo sab naye jamane ki cheez hai.'' It is gracious enough that he carries a mobile phone, though he does manage to forget it at all places all the time.

The talk is ALWAYS of how someone someone knows bent the law in this or that fashion, and the audience ALWAYS has a better story of someone someone. There is a complete and utter absence of ANY social life. Boys and girls seemingly just never meet. All the f*cking that happens, which eventually must because their is no end of biharis(wonder how I keep on using that phrase, as I am very well one which merits the badge by the sheer number of years I have survived in here) happens strictly out of the usual order that nature and the dating rules decreed.

I feel more and more disgusted with Patna everytime I come here. I have a firm belief in the fact that everything, no matter how bad can be set normal. That life just offers too much to choose from to be apathetic about. But Patna defies my expectations. And hopes.

Everytime.

I feel like a large dusty man in a small dusty world.

(oh, and by the way, that opening line is in due reverance to the legendary opening line by Alistair Mcklin, ''A small dusty man on a small dusty table!)