A Strange Occurrence

One Sunday morning, last December, I decided to explore Cubbon Park in Bangalore. It’s far from where I live, so getting there is a task in itself. But the endless green foliage and the State Central Library it shelters make all the hassle worthwhile. I spent the morning just walking with my headphones on and I’d go so far as to say that this simple activity is one of the greatest joys of life. It’s a highly meditative practice. It stills your mind and also gives your body a good exercise. When I am out on one of my walks, I imagine myself as a pilgrim, humming along to songs, going somewhere and nowhere all at once.

A pilgrim would perhaps not stop at a café, but I usually do. This time it was a small café, mostly empty. I ordered a Bombay Sandwich and a Peach Iced tea and sat down at a table. That’s when a woman, perhaps in her forties stepped in. She scanned the café and then proceeded to sit at my table, on the chair opposite mine. I found it a little odd because the other tables were mostly unoccupied. When I was a kid, my mother like every other parent, instructed me to not talk to strangers, and I took the advice I little too seriously. I usually don’t speak unless spoken to and for the most part, I stay lost in my own little world. So I didn’t say a word and neither did she. The lady sitting in front of me never gave me a glance and it seemed like I did not exist in her field of vision.

She seemed a little disturbed. She was fiddling with her wireless earphones, putting them in and then pulling them out. Periodically, she would sigh, look around, look for something on her phone, and then go back to fiddling with her earphones. She then placed an order for a cup of green tea. By then my sandwich had arrived, and I sat eating in silence.

Her order arrived, and she emptied two whole sachets of sugar into the cup. I wondered if the green tea was ‘green’ anymore. All this while, I was having my sandwich while also observing her (it’s all part of the writer’s toolkit). She stirred the tea a little aggressively, had a sip and then made a face. Soon enough, she got up and left. Now the full cup of tea gave me company until the waitress came and took it away.

I found the whole incident a little odd and now so many days later, I still sometimes recall it. I wonder what the woman was going through. I wonder if she was really perturbed or if it was just me projecting my own state of mind. The cup of tea couldn’t have been so awful that it was rejected after a single sip. Or perhaps it was.

Our lives are a collection of so many bizarre incidents. Some we take to be ‘normal’ for we see them everywhere, and some become strange for they are unexpected. Every person has a past, a collection of strange occurrences. Some we live through, while others we watch from afar. It’s a funny world that constantly reminds us that life is a cosmic joke.

Maybe we should not take any of this seriously and keep walking like a pilgrim, humming the tunes of eternity.