I moved to Bangalore ~ 6 months ago.

It’s been weird trying to find a sense of belonging, to say the least. But then again, I don’t think I have found this “sense of belonging” anywhere really.

A while ago, someone remarked to me (not unkindly) how they found the way in which I introduced myself unusual – “Hi, I’m Zenia. Originally from Kerala, but settled in Chennai”. But it’s not unusual to me. This is how I see myself. Not wholly from Kerala, not wholly from Chennai. These are accidents of birth, of life, of family. It’s a question of probability, right?

Not that I feel detached from either of those identities. Funnily enough, by being an outsider in a third place, I feel a stronger connection to both of them. I feel more strongly connected to my “Malayali” identity – home of the greatest food and film (said with obvious bias); the small shops; the old houses; my “hometown” that I don’t always feel at home in. I feel more strongly connected to Chennai – the beaches; the music; the city that adopted me; the city I adopted.

And yet – I don’t belong to either of these places. I feel like when I’m in Chennai or Thalassery, I am part of them, but I am not a part of them. I am a perpetual visitor, stuck somewhere in between these two identities. I enter places with one foot out of the door.

And I don’t belong in Bangalore.

I guess the reason behind this blogpost/poorly-disguised-existential-breakdown is the fact that I’ve been made more acutely aware of the concept of city as identity in these last few months. Being at IISc gives you a unique perspective to Bangalore – in that I’m in Bangalore without being in Bangalore. I’ve met a fair few people these last few months on campus, but no Kannadigas.

There is a fairly popular joke about how the only right way to be from Bangalore is not to be from Bangalore. Naively, I assumed this meant that Bangalore, like me, would be in a fairly constant identity crisis. A constant identity flux. But Bangalore surprised me. Bangalore has made flux part of its identity. The times I get out of campus and interact with Bangalore-the-city is when I see this most acutely. In auto rides. In the metro. At bookshops and bookfairs. In cafes. At the parks. Even IISc, which definitely does have its own identity, ends up being more a part of this identity than I had first assumed.

I’m sorry, Bangalore. I projected my own lack of identity onto you. You have a very firm identity. I see it in the way people talk of themselves as nth generation Bangaloreans. I see it in the way that almost nobody I know here actually speaks Kannada (myself included) but we seem to get by fine anyway. I see it in the way that the most distinct feature that you have is your godforsaken traffic – an endless flux in its own way.

As a teenager, I found this question of identity a difficult one. I felt upset about how I couldn’t connect together all the dissonant parts of me into one coherent story. As I get older, the identity problem doesn’t go away. But I realise that maybe my identity, like Bangalore, is the flux itself. It seems a trivial realisation – humans contain multitudes! But as someone who has felt like the outsider wherever I go - one foot out the door - it’s nice to see an entire city that has embraced outsideness as its identity.

Belonging is a fun word. It’s a noun and a verb. In a certain sense, it describes itself. Belonging is the act of belonging. Omnis cellula e cellula.

I don’t belong in Bangalore. But I do feel a sense of belonging. And I mean that in the verb sense. Present continuous tense. Work in progress.