I wrote this during an autobiographical writing workshop that Monica Pillai hosted for Vishwanath, Mudita and I.
At 21, I moved to Sheffield to do my Master’s in Journalism. This was the first time I’d been out of my house—and the comforting little bubble my parents had created for me—for any stretch of time. On top of that, I was leaving it to go to a completely different country where, barring the language, everything was unfamiliar. (I would soon learn that, actually, even the language wasn’t familiar). It still baffles me that I struck up the courage to make this move; it was my first time experiencing how the force of my conviction could be tangible and able to propel.
I arrived in Sheffield, shielded as it was from Manchester’s rainy squalls, to a crisp autumn day in September. I made it to the university bus to my dorm half an hour after everyone else had boarded, later realising everyone else had deplaned earlier because they flew business class and I economy. Arriving at Ranmoor, I dragged my boxy, typically middle-class Indian suitcase down the manicured slopes, nicking my ankles against the edges all the way.
A2, Ravenstone Apartments was a long gooseneck corridor with four rooms on each side, opening up into a sunny, glass-walled kitchen and living room that remains one of my favourite places till date. My room was the second from the door, a purple ensuite shoebox into which the quilt and pillows I’d ordered from the uni shop had already been brought. After feeling terribly sorry for myself for all of five minutes, curiosity got the better of me. I decided to take a trip down to the grocery store, down the road in an area called Broomhill.
Morrison’s was at the midpoint of the Posh Grocery Store scale, but it was still eyeopening when I walked along the aisles. It would take me only a few weeks to learn the rhythms of that store: the best times to visit, the items to buy on sale versus freshly ordered, which cashiers to go to depending on how neighbourly or recluse-like I was feeling. But that day, I filled my grocery cart with all the essentials, paid an eye-watering amount of money, and lugged my first purchase of my new life all the way home.
