Memories, Lessons And Friends

A few nights ago I was on a flight out from Mumbai to the US. As I tried to sleep, my mind drifted back to a day years ago when I had set out to live in Mumbai. I had two suitcases stuffed with clothes and books, and a motorcycle. With these in my possession, I got onto a train in Delhi and set out on a 16-hour journey to a new life.

When I left Mumbai some years later I had rather more by way of worldly possessions. But despite appearances, the most substantial things that I took away with me when I left that city were not the couple of dozen boxes that got loaded on an eastward bound freighter.

I took with me lessons learned over four years of building a new life in a new city. It does not matter what those lessons were. What matters is that they were the unique, non-replicable product of the experiences that I had in my time in Mumbai. I have vivid memories of those formative experiences. And even though I did not know it then, I can look back now and see how they connected to make me the person that I am.

The thing that amazes me about memory is that it records more than just facts and events. Think back to events in your life that you know to be significant. Chances are that you remember who was there, and what they did and just how it felt. Just thinking about those instances, mentally placing yourself back there, you can sometimes feel the exact same feelings that you did then. Memory is a time machine that each of us carries around in our heads.

I traveled in my time machine that night, cocooned in the dark of an airline cabin. I flickered through memories of “the night where we ….”, and “that crazy time when…” and even “that thing we did not think we would ever get through but we did.” And it struck me that many of those memories centered not on me, but on other people. There were a few people who showed up very often in those memories from Mumbai. They were the friends I made there.

And that’s what I really carried with me when I left Mumbai: memories, lessons and friends.

Since then there have been a few more instances where I moved to a new place to start a new life, and it’s always been the same. With each move my shipment became bigger. And with each move the biggest thing I carried with me was still memories, lessons and friends.

Some of the lessons have been unlearned and some of the friends have faded away. I guess it’s only the deepest truths and the most instinctive bonds that can withstand the twin tests of time and circumstance.

As I write this, my thoughts turn to you, my friend, and the journey that you are about to begin. You’re going to start a new life armed with some boxes, some lessons, some memories and some friendships. I hope your boxes arrive safely. I hope you find that the lessons were worth learning. I hope your memories stay fresh, and become a source of strength. And I hope our friendship is one of those that will pass the tests of time and circumstance.