Tag: bayonne

When I was younger, I would not have dreamt that I would get to live in different continents. Life is an extraordinary adventure if you come to think of it. Did you ever imagine that you would live the life you are living right now? If it has come through for you, just as you conceived it to be, then you have clearly thought it through and life is falling in line with your vision of it. For some like me, it is about change.

When I moved from India to the Blighty, the transition was seamless. I experienced zilch homesickness. I bounce back quickly, you see, from most situations in life. I had left behind my job as a journalist and a hoard of friends who were my lifeline and there were moments of disquiet, for who does not have them.  Yet I was hopping with excitement because Adi and I had been married for all of six months and we were all agog to set up our brand new home together in a new country. It took no time to find our groove.

“Grooves … hide in the local shops and faces that become familiar,” says Lyz. I could not have put it better.

Thus it is that I find this tremendous ache whenever I think of our life in Northampton. The crux of it lies in the people who cropped up in our daily lives. Adi is missing his colleagues, especially his friend S, who remarked upon our change with his own typical brand of humour: “Here you are changing entire countries. I need time getting used to a new shampoo.” This is the same gentleman who had travelled incessantly from London to Brighton, to and fro, after a Friday Night in town.

My points of weakness revolve around the people of Northampton. The grocers I chatted with every day at the fresh market, the bespectacled old grocer who hawked his wares and boomed out, “Good to see you, my laydy,” if we had missed seeing each other for a prolonged period of time. Then there was the woman who dished out spicy noodles from her kiosk at the market square, the concierges who sat at the entrance to our apartment block, the girl who ran with the weights on her back in the park and never forgot to mouth a hello or beam as we passed each other, the man at the golf store who always raised a hand when I ran past him daily to the park.

It is a dull ache now. But it is there. With time, I know it shall fade but I do not want to forget these people who made my life in Northampton that much better with just a smile and a word.

It is with the move to New Jersey that I discover the deal with change. That it can club you with a baton. But there is the recognition too that it is simultaneously opening up the senses to new possibilities. New places. New people. New sensibilities. New home. It is after all a new continent as Osyth points out in all her wisdom.

While nursing a heavy heart, as I think continuously of Northampton and now making the leap to this new world (which I know is the beginning of big and beautiful), I have been blessed by your many kind words and gestures. In her perfect party girl series, where she is featuring bloggers, one at a time, the lovely Cheila put up a post with words that moved me, as did Angela with her quirky take on a ‘Have you met Ted?’ series (ref: How I met Your Mother), through which she introduces her readers to bloggers.

So you all who leave me such wonderful words to sit and guzzle in moments of weakness (and in which I find as much as comfort as I find in a bowl of Chinese noodles), You are an intrinsic part of this feeling called Home.

Below are photographs from an old-world town in New Jersey called Bayonne. We have found our little nook here this town of erstwhile Native Americans, peopled subsequently by masses of Irish workers. The latter erected a beautiful church, a 19th century affair, that rears its head impressively and makes you think of those glorious European churches that you have left behind. On weekends they have a string of stalls set up alongside the church and it is grandly referred to as the flea market. Old men walking their dogs, a few blocks away, ask with some fervour, “Is the flea market any good?” You smile and reply, “Why indeed it is.”

Bayonne is modest. It is so small a town that a handful of eateries can be found on one street. A few salons and a quaint gentlemen’s barber shops can be spotted in the quest for coffee. The last led us to Robert’s Cafe where the smell of coffee doused our senses with its richness. It happened to be a roastery, and yes, I thank thee o god of coffee for this wonderful little discovery. No Starbucks (or Starsucks as a friend calls it) here.

Last Saturday afternoon, we sat in between its faded walls of peach, watched a few old and young people trickle in, as we sipped on gourmet cups of coffee. Our reward for choosing Bayonne as home was this and a slice of apple crumble cheesecake with dollops of whipped cream on the side.