Handle with care

Moving on is more than packing and labelling boxes; its a reflection of your soul and a stamp of myriad memories

Divjot Kaur, AIS Saket, XII

Of the few things in life that gives a bittersweet, a paradoxical pain and pleasure feeling while taking one on a nostalgic roller coaster, ‘moving out’ is one. Be it moving out for a job or a new college, or even a new career, ‘moving out’ is not just about the physical effort of moving furniture and paintings; it is about boxing up memories, ‘to be handled with care’. For those who are yet to experience this blissful fiasco, let’s acquaint you with the strenuous yet oddly pleasing process of shifting and a life changing memory.

Missed me?
The room is a mess, with you sitting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by your belongings that are sprawled in every possible corner. Amidst all the chaos, stumbling across nostalgia hardly comes as a surprise. In one corner you find a picture of you and your friends dressed up as vegetables for the school’s sports day, while another nook houses the teddy bear you used to have at five, and under the pile of clothes is the blanket you never slept without. Old pictures, toys, clothes- every little thing you have ever owned is in front of you and in that moment you can’t help but let old memories flood your mind.

Bizarre Boxes
Once you overcome the nostalgia (which consisted of an hour where you simply looked through your old belongings with a goofy smile), the actual process of packing begins. The thing with boxes is that they are amazing- in how you can just wrap up your whole house in something rectangular made up of cardboard and duct tape- yet absurd- for this rectangular storage, no matter how big always turns out to be insufficient. And so you end up having at least six boxes of just your clothes, three boxes of your action figures and Barbie dolls, and atleast 10 boxes of your study books  and novels.

Moving Away
Packing? Check. Loading? Check. Now comes the part where you have to leave. It’s never easy to uproot your whole life and move to another place, to leave behind the place where you grew up, and it is while standing in front of your childhood home that you realise how real the shifting is. Moving away is tough but it is a door to new experiences, so with a final teary-eyed goodbye you turn around and walk towards a new chapter of your life.

Moving In
Once the quota of tears and memories is complete, it is time to get pragmatic as settling into a new place is anything but easy. It is a new place, a new town and even a new country. Everything is packed, the only place to sit in the new place is the still bubble wrapped (not for long though, considering how we love to pop those bubbles) chair that by some magic does not have a box kept on it. It is an ordeal to arrange everything. But even in all this chaos, true happiness finds its way.
As a consequence of the kitchen not being set up yet, pizza and takeaway burger becomes the meal for a few days (and really, who wouldn’t want that?) Even the local shopkeeper would by now know that you are the new customer. It is a whole new world. Good luck!

Being American Indian

Who doesn’t like informative and fun videos, especially when they’re about saddi Dilli! Arushi Dayal, ASCO, AUUP pens down about the YouTuber, you must follow.

We have become a little too caught up, a little too busy, in the back and forth of our jobs and other things. There is none or little time to go back to what we belong to. Our culture and ethnicity is what we have forgotten. But thanks to people like, Ford Seeuws, who have this unadulterated love for the country and its colour, culture and traditions.
Ford Seeuws is the man behind the YouTube channel, ‘The Surfing Violinist’, where he actually surfs whilst playing violin. He also makes video on meeting people  belonging to different ethnicities and shows us what’s annoying to us, is culture to them, what’s frustrating to us, is bemusing to them, and what we spend hours avoiding, they’ll spend hours studying and researching.
Originally from Florida, Ford Seeuws with his wife and daughter moved to India in 2011.  Our very own Delhi, became their new home. The couple professes that their attraction towards India is the history, culture and the chaos of Delhi. When we are so busy in our life and end up at complaining about age-old traditions, this very chaos is what amuses them and makes them feel right at home. The historical monuments, diversity in types of neighbourhoods (how annoying we know), the street food culture and the wide amalgamation of communities opened the window for them to start making video logs of their life in Delhi. Being a Delhite is savouring the tastes from all the corners of India.
There are anecdotal videos about his family’s first Indian wedding as guests, their first ever experience of celebrating an Indian festival, tips on where to chill in order to beat summer heat, and last but not the least, videos on the Indian political scene.
Honestly, you will be surprised by how much we don’t know about the city we call our home. Sometimes. it takes a foreigner to make us realise that.