Realisation

There are numerous blogs written by now about the Mumbai terror attacks. Some first person experiences and others on what they are feeling about the ordeal. This one is none of those. I am one those fortunate people who did not go through the ordeal and also did not lose any loved one. Can't thank god enough for that.

I live in Delhi - a city which I have grown to like for the past six years. Everytime I went to Mumbai to meet people for any story I had to write, I came back with much more conviction than before that I did not want to live there. It is too crowded, roads are bad and monsoons are terrible. But I also came back with experiences of how lively and easy the people are in the city.

On the day of the attack (Wednesday) the closing of the issue of the magazine I work for had just begun. I came home late. Before hitting the sack, I switched on the television as a routine to watch some news. The news channel I was watching was reporting a gang war in Mumbai. I did not pay much attention at the same time wondering how come I am not updated on the fact that there are gangs present in Mumbai even now.

Dhruv (my husband) called me from Cochin, where he was on office work, early the next morning and asked me to switch on the television. When I did, I went numb. Cursing myself, why was I so selfish to want to sleep when people were getting killed? Two hotels were captured, CST had been hit, Leopold had been hit, people were taken hostages and there was fear all around. I started smsing and calling people I knew in Mumbai. Thankfully everyone was safe.

Television was a constant source of news from then on, at home, in office - all the time hoping, wishing and praying that the ordeal would stop. But it did not. Sometime during the day, Dhruv called to say that two of his colleagues were stuck in a room in one of the hotels. They were safe but couldn't come out. I had never met them. But the agony and distress I was feeling about them are something I cannot describe in words.

There was work to be done in office, the cover story had changed obviously, but the mind was stuck to the television sets. Dhruv returned from Cochin on Thursday night. Instead of the usual pleasentries, all we could say to each other was - what the hell is happening? We were not those unfortunte people who was affected and yet we were. They say you know only when you experience it. Maybe so. But nothing can compare the helplessness we felt in those 60 odd hours.

Throughout the four days there were heart-rending heard stories of loss of human lives and for the first time in my life I cried watching NEWS. Children orphaned, families broken apart by death - what have we done to gain this? This was not a natural calamity then why should innocent people lose their lives?

On Saturday, after the last terrorist was taken care of by the NSG's, I realised it was a weekend. Something every family waits for eagerly, after a week of chaotic work schedules. Strangely, I could not think of one thing I wanted to do this weekend. Did I plan to meet anyone or did I plan to go shopping? I realised I could not take my mind off those images I saw on national television. The baby whose lost both his parents (happy birthday Mose), the septuagenarian who lost his daughters, the journalist whose food reviews I always waited to read, those valiant commandos who went down fighting, the unknown man who lost his five year old daughter and whose wife was battling for life in a hospital, the endless number of injured and the not so lucky hostages. My head is like a film now, which images rolling one after the other running stories of pain, grief and frustration.

There's not much activity at home now and I havn't received a single phone call from friends or family. Not even the credit card companies. It is as if the entire country is paralyzed.

I have never lived in Mumbai. I have never been to Taj or Oberoi even for dinner. But I have been to chowpatty, the Leopold and CST. And I have watched in awe the beautiful structure of Taj from thhe Gateway of India, wishing and wishing. I don't know if I will wish that any longer. I don't think I would enjoy a dinner out anymore. Not out of fear but only that I realise that I am happy being at home with my loved ones - a selfish reaction I know. But is that wrong?