08.11.2002 | 6:46 p.m.
argh ragh argh rahg

I have been so unhappy here the last few days. It's this overwhelming feeling of..."Jesus, I don't fit in. I don't fucking fit in...I've been kidding myself." I guess it started in Wales. Last night, I just sat in bed, crying because I didn't know what else to do. I can't continue living in this environment. I can't do it. There's so much running through my head, I don't even know where to start or how to verbalise it without sounding like I'm on speed. Okay, I need to calm down....

Okay. Before I came to Richmond, all of 8th,9th,10th,11th and for most of 12th std, all I ever did was socialise. Parties, lunches, dinners, trips, clubs.....you name it. Not only that, I genuinely enjoyed it. My parents were really liberal with me which is very unlike most Indian families, so all my friends were always sleeping over at my house because a) I've never had a curfew b) All my friends' parents adored and trusted me with their life. I was popular, I was cute, I was doing well academically, I was happy. My bad days consisted of getting into an argument with a teacher or something. Or like, losing a game of Scrabble, which I still do have an ego about. But yeah life was perfect. In school, everyone knew who I was - the teachers, the younger kids, the older kids....everyone. I was looked up to, I was respected, I was liked. In 10th std, everything started getting worse...

I had always been a skinny child, but I started gaining unusual amounts of weight when I was about 15. I hit puberty later than most girls, so I thought it was just an extension of that or something. But it just kept piling up,and I couldn't figure out why. I am not a big eater at all. AT ALL. Neither of my parents are big, so it wasn't genetic. Turns out I had hypothyroidism. At this same time, one morning my mother shook me out of bed,crying. I thought someone had died. I honestly thought Nanu uncle had died; he was severely ill at that time. Incidentally, he died 5 days after this incident. I walked into my parents' room where she led me, and with my father was this woman he worked with. I recognised her back because she has the ugliest hair I have ever seen on a human being. There it was - my father was in love with another woman, had been screwing her for 8 years, had brought her to the house to tell us that he was leaving us for her. All of that week I couldn't leave the house because Mama kept threatening to kill herself. The one day I got myself to go to school, I had to tell my teachers I was ill and go home because I WAS SO SCARED Mama would kill herself. I got into a huge fight with Daddy a few weeks later when he told me I was an "obese good-for-nothing" who was "wasting the intelligence you've been gifted." That is the history of my eating disorder. That is how I dealt with all of this domestic shit.

I still had a social life. I still had friends. I had my cousins who I love more than life itself. I still liked myself. In 11th std, in all honesty, I doubt I spent more than 5 hours at home every day, excluding my sleeping time. I was doing plays, I was going out clubbing, I was....hanging out, I went to movies, I was going out with boys. I was making all these new friends and meeting all these guys who shared interests with me. I mention them as 'guys' not because I was romantically interested in them, but because all the girls were into...Jennifer Lopez and 10 things I hate about you- I kid you not. I got involved with Shri who I really liked as a friend, and who I was physically attracted to but never really liked him as much as he liked me, as I later found out. We were more than just friends, but we weren't 'dating' either. We kissed and stuff, and.....even held hands one night I think, talked on the phone a lot, and it was just NICE. Those are the relationships most 16 year olds are supposed to be in.

I've realised now though that all those years of happiness and sociability were the most stagnant years of my life. I regret this...but I never read, I never listened to new music, I never watched movies I actually enjoyed....I was just out all the time. My friends provided me no food for thought; I was just stagnating. In a way, my father had been right. I was wasting away a lot of my intelligence. But then, being around people like Vivek just re-introduced me to the crux of my personality. I realised that I was more than just academically intelligent. I knew a lot of stuff, I was well-read, I could hold conversations about things other than the comparative size of clubs. I stopped going clubbing, not because it was 'beneath' me; I just was making myself unhappy by clubbing anyway. By the end of the night, invariably, my friends were all drunk, I was sober. They enjoyed the music, I didn't. They were all fabulous looking and could wear whatever the hell they wanted, I couldn't. I became the ugly duckling of the 'pretty group'. I know that sounds really really shallow and high-school-ish and it is, I guess. I stopped fitting in. All I wanted to do was either stay home and read/listen to music/watch movies or just hang out and talk and laugh and do stupid shit like imitate people.

When I came here,for the first time, for the FIRST time when I came here, people had even heard of the movies and music I was into, they had read the same books, they liked to write, they thought I had a pretty voice. It was the most amazing experience. The first conversation I ever had with Monica was about The Coens; the first conversation I ever had with Theo was about Cohen; the first time I ever spoke in a class, it was about Joni Mitchell. People were reading my writing for the first time, they were telling me I was a good writer which I had never known before. I knew I was smarter than my friends, I had never known that I was smart. I know this sounds really ridiculous, but only those who have lived in Bombay with understand. It makes it hard to explain, but it's true. It was almost fucking impossible to even find someone my age who even *knew* who Bob Dylan was. And I'm sure everyone will agree that everyone knows who Bob Dylan is. So London was just SO overwhelming and exciting and.....enriching. I went out all the time the first few months in London. My friends drank themselves senseless; I helped them walk home. They smoked themselves to severe coughs; I made them soup. They oversexed themselves; I placated their guilt. And they were there for me when I needed them too. My depression was getting worse and I couldnt tell anyone. I couldn't go out anymore because of all the drunk men that tried to hit on me. It never used to bother me in Bombay. It used to be like, "Gross. He just tried to stick his tongue down my throat." or "Tee hee. He just grabbed my ass." Whatever, it happened, the girls learn to deal with it. But everything that happened, I couldn't deal with it anymore. I had been through it a 100 times, I knew that most men get really horny when they're drunk, The crudeness wasn't *me* as much as....just the fact that I was a girl - I was aware of all those things but I just couldn't do it anymore.

The difference between Bombay and London was that in Bombay, I never enjoyed the music or atmosphere or the people. In London, I did. But I had to stop going out because I had panic attacks a lot of the times, and I didn't want to perpetuate that. I'm really digressing and not making sense anymore....

I thought I fitted in here, if not fully, to some extent at least. I guess this is all triggered off by how shitty my week has been. It just makes me feel lonelier than I've ever felt before. I just feel like I really have no friends. I'm not part of the bandwagon. I'm not part of the anti-bandwagon either. I'm kind of stuck in between. Somehow everyone who is interested in the same things as me is really into alcohol/drugs/promiscuity and usually part of some subculture.

I know exactly how and why this personal transition happened, and yet I can't seem to make complete sense of it. You know the whole stereotypical image of an intelligent but socially inept person? Yeah, I never fit into that. I never even believed in it completely. I mean, I didn't think it applied to everyone. But at this point of my life, where finally, finally I can recognise that I am above average intellect-wise, I am also the loneliest I've ever been. On the other hand, when I was frivolous and less critical (just because I never really gave anything any thought), I had a bazillion friends. Now I want best of both worlds. And I don't think I can have it. Because the thought of being that apathetic and unintelligent repulses me. The thought of putting up with my friends' ignorance, close-mindedness etc enervates me. But I want to have fun again. I want to say, "Wow, I had a really really good time!" Like, last semester when Theo and I stayed up singing VU songs REALLY loudly and purposefully off-key and watching The Royal Tenenbaums. Or in Dubai when Ryan and I were being silly and making fun of each other for no apparent reason. Or all the trips I've taken with my family where we listen to Traveling Wilburys and Abbey Road and play guitar and Scrabble and just laugh hysterically because we want to. Or like.....my friend's birthday in Bombay when Shri and I went to the rocks by the sea at 4:00 am and just sat there, talking.

I just....I want to get out of here. I don't know where to go because I can't escape myself at all. The only way to fit in is to drink and do drugs. Or have animated conversations about the girth of my 7th sexual partner in 2 months. But Bombay is the same way now; everyone grew up.

This is not a good time to be Aurina at all. Anyone want to trade places? I didn't think so.

deja vu? | jamais vu?