The One With the Strange Soup

Tune Jo Na Kaha, from New York (rendered by Mohit Chauhan)

I had the chance today to return to my campus after the span of a year, which is a long time when you consider the chunk of time we as students spend in our college campuses. I always loved my college campus. As I’ve written elsewhere, I also grew to be deeply affectionate and grateful for my college itself, and the time I spent there was something I’ll never regret. My best memories are of the wonderful people I met there, my best friends, who are still such a constant part of my life.

And so, invariably, while walking those familiar paths I know so well, while taking the shortcuts and walking in and out of hallways and meeting dear professors and old colleagues, a deep nostalgia set in. Walking past the flowerbeds, around the fountain, down to the quad and past the green fields…walking past benches my friends and I had often accosted, past hillsides we had rolled down or just sat and chatted, past halls where we’d gather to do our homework, past the campus coffee house…past all these places that brought to life so many memories. I could almost see us there, almost see ghostly selves wandering around with me. I was struck with this deep longing of going back to that time. I wanted so much to be, once again, one of these students who walked around with a sense of belonging and a sense of ‘owning’ the place, which was something that had once belonged to me. Just for a day, I wanted to be the college student I was eighteen months ago, running around with a hundred things to do, holding on to a gigantic book and constantly smiling and waving at acquaintances as they passed me by. Stopping for a quick chat with a friend at the fountain. Taking a breather in the late afternoon at the park and watching the ducks go by. For one day, I wanted to go back to that time, or rather, to that feeling. It hasn’t been that long since I left that phase of my life, and yet, I already wanted to revisit it.

I got back to the car and, while driving around the campus, impulsively decided to visit a Chinese restaurant that was a favorite joint back in the day. A few of my friends loved this place, and I loved its dumplings and hot and sour soup. I wasn’t especially hungry; I simply wanted to relive that time, that taste, those late night take outs. I just wanted to vividly taste that past.

So I walked in and ordered dumplings and the hot and sour soup, and some veggie lo mein to go. All for still the same low cheap student price I remembered. And I sat down, contented and retrospective, to wait.

Ten minutes later a plate of the most unhappy dumplings I have ever seen were brought out. The soup looked attractive, but the dumplings were dumpy and soggy. Nevertheless, I dug in with enthusiasm. The dumplings lived up to their appearance: they were less than mediocre and not at all what I remembered. I had to slosh them in soy sauce for some flavor, and even then I managed only three. Turning more hopefully to the soup, I took a big gulp, almost burning my mouth, tasting something that can only be described as gelatinous water mixed with chili. It was, honestly, terrible. I only managed a few more bites before I just gave up completely, and sat there trying to figure out what had happened…

Did this food, which I once enjoyed so much, deteriorate in its quality? In one year, especially in the past economically turbulent year, had the owners compromised on the taste of their dishes? Had the chef changed?

Or was it that over the past year, my experiences with authentic food all over Asia and tasting true Chinese food had completely changed my expectations? Had the food always been this bad and I just didn’t know better?

I can’t tell you which one is true here, but while I sat there debating this, I took one more bite of the soup (since I hate wasting food) and the intense heat was like a slap that made things clearer. I’m always asking for signs and lessons from the universe and here was a huge one staring me right in the face. I had spent the afternoon mourning for a phase of my life that had passed by for good. I had been indulging myself in nostalgia, wishing myself back to a time that I had already moved on from. And the terrible food of this restaurant, which was just part of that mosaic from the past, was a reminder that I can’t go back. Here, in an unappealing manner on my plate, was clear evidence that I could never go back, and that my life had moved on (as it should).

It was in no way a sad realization. It came in the form of a calm, matter-of-fact, sensible voice, and it made sense. Yes, my collegiate life was beautiful…it had its ups and downs, its emotions and its upheavals, its celebrations and its joy. But…its over. And in the time that has followed I have had experiences of a completely different kind, amazing, wonderful, influential experiences that have changed my life. I differ greatly, in a very good way,  from the girl who came in as a freshman into this campus. I changed over my years as a student, and when I left, I continued to change, and life continued to move, faster than I could ever have imagined. It did for all of us, we all changed, we all moved on, and in the last month I had had the pleasure of seeing all my dear friends and being proud of the lives they are leading, the people they have become. I am grateful for and proud of the person I myself am today. I am wiser, I am calmer, I am more at peace with who I am than that child scurrying around campus. I am at terms with my scars, even proud to show them off, and so much more confident about where I am leading myself and all I want to do. Sure, I am moving onto another phase where I have again so much to learn, where I’ll crash and burn, where I’ll start from scratch and struggle and suffer, where there will be umpteen challenges…but it is still my future, and I will still be eager to be in it.

I can’t ask for the past to come back. I can cherish my memories, but I can’t, and I shouldn’t, try to relive them. That period should be remembered with joy, but never with longing or with a pointless desire to return, because my world has moved on. Just as we shouldn’t regret the past, we also shouldn’t hold it by its coat strings and beg it to take us back when the brilliant surprise of our future is waiting solemnly, hands entwined with the present, waiting for our attention. After all, that is where my attention is deserved.

It doesn’t matter what the real reason behind the disappointing taste of the soup or the dumplings may have been. The fact, I know, is that it wasn’t meant to taste the same to me. That time had changed, that person had changed, and so the taste, too, had changed. It was a sign, or rather, a marker in time.

And so I took a last look at the left overs, smiled, and left, driving away from the city in the late afternoon sun, peaceful with this new knowledge and a true sense of closure.