How do you survive…..

There was a serious discussion between two of my acquaintances last week on whether Chennai is better than  Bangalore or vice versa. The argument escalated to a point where one of them asked "how do you even survive this place?!?!" I have been thinking about this sort of questions for the past few months or so - what makes a place better livable than the other. 

Whenever such a survey is conducted by magazines or any organizations, they consider climate, basic amenities, accessibility and transportation etc. The more and more I think about it, I am wondering if only these parameters decide your preference for one place over the other. All these may have an influence! But primary factors are who all do you have in a city / village and what memory do  you carry about a place - that make it more livable or otherwise.

In early February I traveled to Tirunelveli by train. There was a young family traveling from Kashmir to Kanyakumari. We all know how Kashmir is struggling to get out of gun shots! But during our chat, the young lady - mother of two beautiful kids - said gun shots are a daily affair but she loves Kashmir and can never imagine leaving the place for ever!

Another friend of mine - a middle aged man - from a Mediterranean country that is torn by bomb shells every day, exclaimed that he misses his village and given a chance he would like to go back to the little village

Every village, every city in this world is beautiful and has its own nice things. Your filters let only the good things in when you have other reasons to love the place; and when you do not have any other reasons to like a place, if you have reasons to feel bad, your filters work other way around! Only when you are neutral, you can observe without any color glasses and that is very rare!