When love and hate collide

To,

Whomsover it may concern

You tell me that I am pathetic and terrible. You tell me that I am a big gutter that is full of shit!. You tell me that I am maddening and a pain. That I cause you to tear your hair out in frustration. How would you feel to be abused relentlessly? But that, my friends is the sad reality I have to grapple with almost everyday as you complain 24/7 about major aspects about my personality - the infrastructure, the traffic, the sanitation problems, the high cost of living, the overcrowding...But at the same time, defying logic, you love me as well. You love the buzz, the vibrancy, the culture, the people, the money and the magic, the spirit..you and I, we share this unique love-hate relationship.

I am not oblviious to the problems you state. But I ask all of you, is it my fault that I am seen as a land of opportunity, the commercial capital of the nation, a land which promises the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Is it my fault that so many of you come to me and take solace in my loving embrace that I have always provided for so many years? Is it my fault that there is no really viable alternative destination which can lend a shoulder to me and provide similar opportunities? Is it my fault about the apathy shown by your elected representatives who have neglected me?

But you continue to blame me and abuse me and yet you continue to live here. It may be because some of you have lived with me and loved me too long and going and settling anywhere else is no longer an option. Some of you have learned to adjust with me like sitting on the fourth seat on my local trains. And some of you are forced to stay with me because you know that the opportunites I provide are not available elsewhere. But your abusing and adjusting at the same time, alternating bouts of hatred and love have continued to confound me.

And then I ask myself - how did I become what I have become today? This thriving and yet decaying paradox? And the answer dawns on me - humbly and simply. I am just a collective noun, a representation of a unique people. An assimilation and a melting pot of all of you and the values you embody.You are the ones who have made me famous and have given me this vibrant, dynamic, cosmopolitan nature. You are the ones who have turned me into the city which never sleeps. But it is equally true that you also are the ones who have the power to elect your representatives responsible for governing me effiicently and protecting me. You are also the ones who have created the garbage and the traffic jams, the pollution and the greed...Most of you have good intentions. But most of you are too busy in your daily lives to do anything about it. Its not that you have not tried - the victory in the battle to preserve my open spaces and your intense and continuing pressure on the govt. over the state of my potholed roads fills me with hope. But much more is needed. You know that as well.

I hope that you realise that I am only as helpless as you are. You have made me what I am today. And only you have the power to prevent me into turning what I am now becoming - decaying and crumbling.

Yours (hopefully),

A city of dreams/nightmares,

Mumbai