But in the midst of all the madness, whenever I remembered what the party was about, the melancholy took over and it was all I could do not to tear up and start lamenting the loss of this oh-so-warm home of mine… of course, I did end the night in tears but that’s a whole other story and quite irrelevant to this post.
It’s hard to explain my peculiar attachment to this house of mine… it’s just an average two bedroom apartment off the block… it must be about six years old which isn’t too old but quite old for my demanding modernity standards… we leased it in quite a hurry… after all, it was a lot bigger than the old one and the master bedroom actually had an ensuite bathroom which I thought was a luxury I’d involuntarily given up forever the day I left my home in Madras… but on the evening we started moving in two years ago (almost to the day), I noticed a lot of things I hadn’t noticed before… the carpets were moderately stained (and to which, stains have since been generously added by the number of parties we’ve had)… some of the wood was chipping… a few of the lights didn’t work… the guy who’d vacated hadn’t put too much into cleaning it for the new tenants… it was high ceilinged, so that was just begging for cold draughts of air... even the water tasted funny (and it still does… and its impossible to get cold water out of the freaking tap… and I’m addicted to ice cold water… tepid water I can’t even swallow)… and worst of all, it was located in a completely alien suburb and I felt quite sure I’d never enjoy living here…
You see, before this, my entire universe was centred on the Melbourne CBD… my first awful apartment on Swanston Street and my university not even 3 minutes away walking… that apartment was truly dreadful… it was the size of my finger… but the convenience of living next door to city life was incomparable… not that I had any money to enjoy city life… but still, the bright shiny lights were right outside my doorstep…
After six months of living like sardines though we moved just up the street and right to good ol' Lygon Street. Compared to Swanston, the Lygon Street apartment was like a mansion... and it was all sparkly and shiny and brand new and I thought I'd never want to live anywhere ever again... I quickly grew to love the area... it wasn't the poshest or even the nicest of areas... Carlton is notorious for mob activity and theft in general and we've witnessed our share of car chases... not the actual cars, but choppers flying all over the place and us having an illegal smoke on our balcony with the light shining down on us and wondering if our number was finally up... good times :)... paranoid times, but good... our car was broken into twice in our alleged secure basement carpark... but still, it was all quite safe and we walked home late at night from the restaurant/shopping part of Lygon Street many many times... my university was now a 10 minute tram ride away but 10 minutes in the life of a student is negligable... of course, paying for the tickets was a huge unwarranted expense and that's when I started that whole deal with God thing about fare evasion :)
But the most important thing of all was I absolutely loved heading home... walking up to the entrance and through the front door always made me feel welcome... it was clean so we tried our best to keep it clean... there are some aspects to my personality that are rather Monica Geller like in terms of getting mildly obsessive compulsive with cleaning... but in the old place I shocked myself at my complacency with collecting dirty dishes in the sink, not wiping the counters after cooking, never dusting or vaccuming... but all that changed and housemates of mine surely regret how I reverted to my natural ways... I became mildly obsessive compulsive again about the kitchen and my wrath at dirty kitchen counters and undisposed of garbage was not easy to deal with...
You see, this was the first time I felt like I had a home again after leaving my real home... and it was important to me to have the kind of home that made me want to go back to it... what else do you have to look forward to in a strange foreign country if not some place to call your own and make your own... we were always strange that way... other Indian students thought we were nuts when they saw the "fancy" place we lived in... most of them lived in disgusting little holes or an hour away from civilization... because of the rent, of course... as a struggling student, I had a strict stipend per month from home... this strict stipend was suggested by IDP as being more than enough and I know now who they spoke to to come up with this figure... the ones living in the dirty little holes... so here we were, shelling out half our monthly allowance on rent of all things... that left very little leftover for food/expenses/books/entertainment... but I never regretted it once... there was my beautiful apartment, a shining beacon of hope in the midst of all my homesickness and coursework and meagre social life... So until now we were still very focussed on Lygon Street and the CBD and I really had no clue what was outside these boundaries... on rare occassions I went down to Chapel Street or Smith Street or Sydney Road or St. Kilda Road and these were all slightly frightening adventures outside my comfort zone... they were also outside my "hood" so I always bought a tram ticket... and always, I breathed a sigh of relief as soon as I returned to familiar territory.
Then the unthinkable happened... I finished studying and was lucky to get a job almost immediately but this job was all the way down St. Kilda Road, past the CBD, on the other side of the Yarra River (you could almost call it the wrong side of the tracks for me). After almost two years of waking up whenever I felt like it I had to discipline myself to going to bed on time and waking up at 7:30 am so I could leave by 8:15 or so to get to work by 9:15. Yes, it took me the better part of an hour which just shows you what cruel tricks life can play on you… because distance wise, and if I was driving there, it would be all of 20 minutes. But thanks to the wonderfully slow trams that absolutely insist on stopping at every tram stop (which is at every block) and because I had to cross the city on the way and since of course the city is full of thoughtful drivers who are always driving in the tram lane and slowing things down even more, it used to take me that long… And did I mention the sardine theme again every single morning and evening because I was travelling at peak hour? There was simply no relief until I was 3 blocks away from work or home by which point it didn’t matter… I did this for about 2 months before deciding I just couldn’t go on and absolutely had to take the drastic decision of leaving Lygon Street and my beloved hood Carlton and moving to the other side of the city, the names of which suburbs I didn’t even know yet.
By the time we did move, it was something like six months… August 2004… Dandenong Road, Prahran… as I said, at first, I was miserable to move in… but in the first week of arriving at work/home within 12 minutes by tram including waiting time, it was quite easy to forget about Lygon Street (shame on my fickleness) J There were still annoyances such the tepid water and Dandenong Road being the busiest road leading to some few outer suburbs and being busy 24/7 so there was never any respite from traffic noise, but even this worked out in our favour because we could scream our heads off and sing our lungs out and have 20 people simultaneously talking on the balcony and there wouldn’t even be a polite knock from a neighbour asking us to keep it down… we took full advantage of this over two years and hosted a number of loud and rowdy events.
So you see, slowly but surely my universe shifted to this side of the city… I still went to the city for drinks and dinner and what not, on occasion, but I also started visiting more shops/restaurants/bars in my area… since my work was also in the area, we spent many a lunch hour roaming the streets of Chapel and High and Commercial (we shouldn’t leave St Kilda Road out of it too… remember the beautiful bay views)… it’s hard to explain exactly why it is so special… I guess everywhere else is just pretty boring and average… what you see is possibly the same thing you’ll see in other cities around Australia… but Prahran and South Yarra and especially Chapel Street are so eclectic and surprising, you just never know what you’re gonna get… and its my absolute favourite area to drive around looking at all the beautiful houses… at least 30 of my dream houses are located on Orrong Road and Toorak in general… this area is the playground of the very rich and even though I didn’t live in a multimillion dollar house, it still felt pretty good to tell people I lived in Prahran…
And this was the truest test of my love for this side of town… my new job is in the city… yet another cruel life trick… so now I sit (if ever I do get a seat) on the tram for 50 long minutes one way as I travel to work and back… and yes, it bothers me but not once have I ever felt like just escaping… well maybe, some mornings… but every evening, as soon I cross the Yarra, I don’t regret for a minute that my home is still half an hour away… after all, my home is in Prahran… my home is right next door to Chapel Street…
Do I visit Chapel Street every night or weekend? No…
Does that make a difference? No…
Is it enough just knowing its there? Yes…
Just like the beach in Madras, I suppose…
Could we ever get by in a non-coastal city even though we swam in the sea maybe thrice a year? No!
So anyway, our time together is almost up… Sep 1 is when I move… I’m moving to high-rise, non-unique, commercialised personified – Southbank! Why, after all this, am I leaving Prahran you ask? Because it wasn’t affordable in Prahran to buy the kind of place I could see myself living in… Yes, dear reader… I am now a first home owner – a fact that fills me with immense pride and intense dread, all at the same time. And even though Prahran was not really affordable, there were a couple in my old hood Carlton that might’ve worked but I just couldn’t bear the thought of moving to that side of the city again after having lived on this side… this side rocks… that side is seemingly dark and depressing now even though I didn’t know any better then… so anyway, I had to compromise somewhere and Southbank it is… the best thing about Southbank is that work will be a 7 minute tram ride or a 20 minute walk… I see plenty of exercise potential… but anyway, the new place is a whole other story that I’ll save for later.
I think I forced everyone at the party to have a shot of some killer fruit punch (concocted by yours truly) as a tribute to the Dandenong Road house… now the apartment seems to know that I’m moving on and is reacting with uncharacteristic coldness and emptiness… Not to worry… it will always one of the dearest places I’ve lived in… I’m quite sure when its time for me to move on from Southbank I will feel a similar sadness and write about how I regretted leaving Prahran but finally ended up madly in love with Southbank, but that’s just the way I am J I get peculiarly attached to places which after all are just wood and carpet… I think it’s because I am at heart a most intransient being… I get comfortable someplace and never want to leave… I’ve lived in the same house in Madras my whole life and when I had to move out once for six months while renovating I thought my parents were being most unfair to me by kicking me out of my room… as it turned out it worked out well that I lived in Nungambakkam and Adyar for half that time because at least I got to have a very fun summer without having to deal with the annoying logistics issues that are part and parcel of living in Annanagar…
So whatever it is, it’s always hard for me to move on… but eventually I adapt and mostly it works out better than I expected… this is true of any change in my life… so what’s the lesson learned here… nothing… because even though I know I will adapt, it doesn’t stop me from feeling sad at leaving.
So whatever… goodbye Prahran… hello Southbank!
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