Escape

Many years ago while still an impressionable youngster in high school I read a line "Patriotism is nothing but loyalty to a piece of real estate" or something to that effect. 

So, a "Madrasi" from before it got Chennaied, a "Mumbaikar" who arrived long after the quiet and cowardly burial of Bombay, someone who is even guilty of that biggest of all treasons, a South Indian who's equally comfortable with a Punjabi breakfast of a Rajasthani/Gujarathi "thali" as with a Matunga "Mumbai rice plate"....

Yes, if I was given an opportunity to re-settle myself outside this blessed land of 33 lakh crores of Gods and Goddesses, I honestly would not hesitate. 

Which corner of this wide wide world would I go to? Obviously somewhere to a land where English is spoken - though not necessarily the exclusive language. Where roads are good; where power supply is something that can be taken for granted the way we take the air that we breathe; where the police are at one's service and not there to bully one or extract some hafta; where, poor diabetic me can use a "Public Convenience" without feeling my breakfast come gagging up my throat while I am trying to become "convenient" (what a euphemistic word, that!) - that wish list could go on and on, endlessly. 

So, quiet, forgotten, down under New Zealand seems idyllic... or perhaps Hawaii? Or do I need to access Platform 7 3/4 and escape to the world of Hogwarts....

Where a Vasant Dhoble or a Bal Thackeray or an Akbarduddin Owaisi or a Narendra Modi or a Mamta Banerji.... may perhaps not qualify for even a tourist visa...

Into that heaven of freedom, my Lord, let me escape :)