Exile in the Kingdom...

Life and its ironies. One cannot begin to fathom the cruelty with which life will handle you with its deals. We make plans for our lives and then life goes on to make other arrangements for us instead. Its twisted. An Exile is normally when one away from the kingdom, but then as my life would have it, mine was set within the kingdom... the Kingdom of Bahrain. My plan started as harmlessly and simple as possible. I wanted to make a fresh start, a new challenge, also with a few personal goals in mind. That was about 6 months ago. Now it looks like I am worse off, and being back at square one. In fact feels like I have been moved of the board game altogether...ejected.

I still remember when in early Feb I landed in Bahrain... Everything was different from back home and i was hungry to gorge all that i could see, to feel and adapt to the surroundings. Starting a new job and being in charge. Thrills down my spine every day. I was caught in a sense of euphoria in a way, looking at all things as cheerful and bright. A new office, and a new outlook, meeting new people on a daily basis, all polite and comforting and I was busy figuring out the way things could start working in my favor. Being a small city it was easy to get around, sitting in the backseat of a car with a driver at my beck and call. I was drowning in the new found pleasure of walking around in the evenings, long walks with an eye out for the unusual to stick out. The place was filled with fast and exotic cars, crowded and bustling streets, always with a sense of something happening. It was going to be glorious summer... I could feel it. The days were filled with active pursuits, in the malls, driving around getting a feel of the place, meeting people and trying to pitch in for business.

We are not always aware of when seasons change, when the pleasant chill becomes a spine chilling cold even before you realize it. It did, the atmosphere changed and so did my view of the place and everything else eventually. I guess we also start looking at things differently when it doesn't work out the way we expect it to. A couple of months down the rabbit hole and i realized that nothing had changed, at least for good. I was still doing the same rounds, trying to recruit people, trying to get business, trying to enjoy a static life that was not moving anywhere. My delusions of grandeur were getting to be weary. Even the politeness of the people was getting to me. Distant calls for help to people back home to get talent was going on unheard. I realized its futile in a way for help to come in from across the seas when from within the city people had given up. I was marching on alone without even knowing it. And things started turning sour to a point of ridicule.

The one luxury that kept it going was the availability of a vehicle and a driver. That rug got pulled from under my feet first. Driver left and so did the vehicle eventually. The one other soul in the office, the only assistance in person was the next to go. Soon I was staring at the four walls in the office, being immobile and the daily task was simply to get to office and back home everyday. It was solitary confinement in motion. I was free to do absolutely nothing in fact. Like a regimented fool i would walk about in the evenings, the same old dreary route day after day without a clue to what it was, that i was to achieve. The pleasant sounds soon turned to cacophony and all the things that used to look bright and cheerful just became an eyesore. Nothing had changed, at least from the outside, from within everything had changed in fact. I just kept the clock ticking, barely.

The dust storms in the city was a reflection of how clouded my mind was getting day after day. The city was empathizing with me in fact. Staring into the streets late in the night, I could see the cars and other vehicles busy on the roads. I was watching as if it was a parade on my behalf every night, showing off how active the city could get, leaving me far far behind, alone on a roof top. My resolve to go on had simply run out. I had run out of any ideas of survival... simply given up. It was almost as if i was banned to the heights of my abode and just allowed to watch the activities in which people engaged in, without having the chance to get involved, not to be included in the games that kids from the block played in. I remembered how helpless i could be, just like the kid from long ago. Life had come full circle again.

So, it is now, just one decision that I can make. Thats the only one in my hands to make even. To quit. And thats what it has come down to after six months of being in suspended animation. I quit. The exile in the Kingdom is over. Is the emirate jaunt to be of any difference? Will the sun shine there? I live in the hope that someday the meaning of my existence might start making sense, to me at least. And far removed from now, I might look back and see some sense in this Exile in the Kingdom even...