Sometimes in life, you meet someone for a very brief time and you have an experience which is like a summertime game, an aftertaste of stollen pickles–which hangs on your lips as a smile because what you remember is the simplicity of the event itself.

Suppose you are walking along a busy street drowned in your thoughts and suddenly a stranger brushes by. You catch a whiff of his scent, you know the perfume but you cannot quite place it–maybe someone dear wears it–maybe you had tried it out sometime. This millisecond of a memory search compels you to take a look at that person but it is too late–the person has submerged into the sea of people walking you left behind. You keep walking and by the next street corner, you have forgotten the event itself until the next time you actually remember the scent.

I often try to run away from myself– to small towns, hills, seasides. People call them trips–I would like to see them as escapes. Whether I really escape from anything at all is what I have been thinking about lately. But this story is not about that–it is about meeting a stranger.
Last spring, I had run away to a small coffee town. The solo trip had some precursors. The previous night I had departed from a city that had taken from me much—so I had left a letter by a fireplace and a kiss on a forehead. In the pre-summer deserted streets of that small coffee town–I knew I could get lost. But I wasn’t staying in the city either— I was staying in an old beautiful cottage turned hostel amongst a coffee plantation.

There was nothing much to do–besides sleeping in a hammock, or go on walks with the two pet dogs—Bonny and Clyde, talk with a few other boarders and wait for the first rains to wash the summer stickiness, visit an odd church or pagoda, search a bird—typical lazy summers.  And I wrote in my diary –” in the event of an escape and the salvation from someone who you unknowingly held close—whatever falls in your hands are gems that flesh out in silence……there is a strange comfort in being among strangers. You just do not have to participate–you may as well ignore them..”

On the evening before I left—I went out for a walk. Bonny and Clyde followed me. They were chasing butterflies. I sat down beside a small stream and listened to the birds. Right then I saw a girl cross by. I had seen her arrive that afternoon to the hostel. She had an unimpressive demeanor— remarkably simple. We simultaneously waved at each other. She stopped to chat with me— the type of chat that travelers mostly share.
So, Jennifer was from Scotland and was traveling India.
“Did you like India?”
“I have been falling sick:—“. She said with a matter-of-fact tone that was not condescending but which impressed me. We had quite a few similarities– we both had recently left our jobs and we both were trying to figure out our lives. We both were traveling back home after this and was about to decide the next step in our lives.

Clyde was getting restless with my standing at one place. So I waved Jenny goodbye.
I came back, packed my bag, took my sketchbook to the cozy attic. There I slumped on a bean bag and stared listlessly at the roof. I wasn’t thinking about anything particularly–just humming as my playlist played on my cell phone. Suddenly Jenny appeared. She hadn’t expected me there but lied down in a divan nonetheless. She was also staring at the roof through her thick glasses.
Minutes lapsed. The song turned to “K”–one of my favorites by a band I dearly loved. Listening to that, Jenny sat up.. “Is that… K..you listen to Cigarettes after sex?”
“Well yes.. they are my favorites.”
She said—“mine too… their songs are like these cushions that protect you–like an assurance that everything in this world is still right”

I was still staring at the ceiling—but I wondered–has anybody ever put my feelings so perfectly into words.? After the song, I sat up to sketch. It turned out that Jenny sketched too. We looked at each other’s books and discussed our ideas of art which were startlingly similar. She had a strange fascination for leaves. Her book was a kaleidoscope of different shapes and sized leaves. After that I was about to leave– I bid her goodbye, gathering my stuff. we bid goodbye.
As I was leaving, she pointed towards a handmade bag that I was carrying— “Is that handmade?”
“Yes…a friend made it”…and I remembered the letter that I left before I came.
“That must be a really special friend”, she said with a smile.

I left with a puzzle—with an eerie familiarity that I could not quite place. As I stood outside and stared at the clouds silhouetted in the moonlight, I realized where the familiarity lay—Jenny was almost like a mirror. Whatever such meetings are called–luck, soul meets—for the first time in life, I had experienced the profundity of speaking to someone who is exactly me.

I realized–for most times the whiff of the scent that we couldn’t remember when a stranger passed by—actually belonged to us. We are all like musk deer, bewildered by a memory of ourselves–what we were and what we believe that we no longer are– except at times when someone exactly like us stands in front of us–and you realise how you still are the same you and your ships of escapades can never really take you away from the port called you.

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