26/11: Uncomfortably numb…

Usually walking by the river in the evenings is a pleasant thing if you are in a city as pretty as Budapest. From the initial days of being overawed by the sheer beauty of the place or the constant desire to explore a new city to now, the warmth of familiarity – there has always been so much to appreciate and be all chirpy about…

However, it hasn't been so for more than a week now.

Not since that fateful afternoon when I was waiting for my flight back to Budapest - a day before the "Thanksgiving Day". From a distance I could make out that the giant LCD screen showing CNN had something familiar on it - I knew that building! For the next couple of hours till I boarded the flight, all I did was watch with disbelief at what was unfolding in Mumbai - at the places I have been all too familiar with having lived in the city for a year not so long ago.

I do not remember having watched news continuously for so long ever before in my life. It hasn't stopped yet. At first I convinced myself that it is normal, after all this has been an unprecedented act of terror on my country's soil and it is all but natural for me to want to stay connected as much as I can, sitting thousands of miles away. I have read each and every article that has been published related to this tragic event, I have seen all the news clippings that have either revealed something new or are taken from talk shows and panel discussions that have spawned all over the world media. It is almost as if I am incapable of "switching off" from the information invasion.

Trying to make sure I don't get swayed by partisan media coverage, I have spent hours assimilating content from foreign media as well - all the conspiracy theories, the allegations and the counter-allegations. I am sure by now I can probably put to shame the leading experts on the situation with the diverse views I have subjected myself to over the past 2 weeks.

But this is now beginning to scare me.

All I can think of when I am not going through the news is trying to make sense of it all in my head. Struggle to somehow figure out a way of this madness, break the problem down into smaller chunks that are easier to deal with than the mess it looks as a whole. This paralysis of analysis has started affecting my actions, my temper, my sleep pattern and unfortnately even the walks that I so enjoyed earlier.

I am clearly not being part of the solution at the moment.

Epilogue:
There was no underlying point to this post; just like there isn’t yet any to what has been happening first in Mumbai and then in the world media since 26/11. I am still not sure what I wanted to share here – was it grief, helplessness, a purposeful action plan…I don’t know.

….guess I am just uncomfortably numb.