The New Girl

Dear Ma,

As I’m writing this letter to you, I am watching the sky through my dorm’s window steadily blush into a clear blue shade from darkness, leaving a golden trail upon the treetops. My first morning at ACJ; my first sunrise in Chennai.

I should tell you I am missing you guys. I could tell you that I am fine. But honestly, I don’t know which of them would be a lie and which wouldn’t. Is this what homesickness feels like? Maybe I’m just sleep-deprived. Couldn’t sleep well last night. The bed was too hard and the pillow wasn’t made of the material like the once at home. I did doze off for a while. But then, it was very disorienting not to wake up to your voice; even slightly alarming.

What should I write to you about, Maa? I have never been good at grappling my feelings well enough to talk about them with clarity. Especially so early in the morning. Maybe I should just stick to my dorm. Yeah, I could tell you about my window in Room 308.

Outside its iron grills, there’s this endless stretch of treetops; lush canopies intricately entwined into one another, like a mesh. Some of them are Krishnachura; I identified from their leaf-like yellow and red flowers. I grew up seeing so many of these in Kolkata, lining the busy streets of Lake Town, filling the wilderness of rural Bengal, or simply painted in the pages of Tagore’s writings. Never did they strike as so beautiful to me. Especially the flowers. I wish I could touch them.

I can’t see the sea from my window here, but I think I can smell it. What else could that salty odor be? It’s a little disturbing. I think I’m again going to be the one weird one out here to have an utter disregard for the beauty of the sea. Or should I just pretend that those live waters don’t bother me, just to fit in? Never mind, I’ll fail miserably.

If I close my eyes, sitting near this window, I can almost fool myself that I’m home. I can hear cuckoos call from the woods, and pretend like it’s coming from our backyard. I can hear the distant muffled sounds of speeding trains, their iron wheels grinding against the tracks. The whoosh of an occasional airplane, the swishing of the tree in the wind, the faraway gong of a church bell… I can almost convince myself that I’m standing on our terrace and it’s just another day.

But it is not, and now even the alarm has rung. I’m sitting in my hostel dorm and my first day at ACJ has just begun. I’ll now have to leave my confused musings at this desktop and go be a journalist. Wish me some luck.

P.S.- Don't freak out, but I have this weird feeling that I'm not alone in this room.

Love,

You know who.