Adulting in India: Navigating the Real World
There was no doubt that moving to a new city was difficult. I was uprooted from family, friends and the mundane comforts of home. They were replaced by the sweet company of mainly two things: my phone, which became increasingly crucial to stay in touch and socialise with people; and my restless mind, which revolted against change by thinking of ways to escape. But living alone also taught me a lot of pearls of wisdom.
The biggest pearl of wisdom that life flung at me was that people were essentially annoying, when I lived with them. It was representative of a larger lesson I learned: human beings were not easy to live with. Yes, by now we should have evolved to coexist peacefully, but the wars, conflicts and primetime news channels proved that we hadn’t learnt from our stupidity. No matter how good the person or how great the friendship, they eventually became intolerable. The degree of annoying-ness was directly proportional to the degree of things, responsibilities and space I shared with them. For example, someone who was perfectly fine living in the other room became excruciatingly annoying when we shared the same bed, the same bathroom and sometimes, the same food (reluctantly).
There was also the delicate politics of maids and cooks. Working millennials are completely dependent on hired help, which the latter know and use to their advantage. In the beginning, I tried to establish my dominance by admonishing them for coming late or not coming at all. They retaliated with demands of a salary hike, Diwali gifts and threatening to leave as a last resort. Once I realised that they followed their own tune and timetable, I learnt not to lose my cool. In fact, I even returned the emotional blackmail by calmly telling them to quit, even though neither of us left or let go. As they say, we can’t live with them, we can’t live without them.
The true meaning of “money doesn’t grow on trees” hit me hard when I started working. Like most privileged people, I had a cushioned upbringing, which meant barely any idea about finances. I for one didn’t know how to pay electricity bills. Now there was rent, transport, groceries, medicines, salaries of my indispensable workforce...the list went on. I also found myself surprised by the prices of certain commodities. Did you know that 5 slices of cheese cost 70 rupees? Or that potatoes were cheap but garlic was expensive? In short, I learnt that everything cost money, and it was not a pretty realisation.
Living away from home really brought out the best and worst in me. I realised my shortcomings, which I didn’t know before because there was always someone to soften the blow. At the same time I learned exactly what I was capable of. I knew that even if I fell, I could get up, dust myself off, and proceed to haggle with the auto-wallah.
