Liam Sharma: The story of how I lost my mind in India
Eat Pray Party Love.
It’s 2 AM on a Thursday morning, and I’m wobbling around the backstreets of North Goa, India, trying to figure out how the fuck I am going to get back to my hotel. I had just left this random hole in a wall where I was slapping Patron Silver Tequila shots back with these two random backpackers who were trying to make out with each other. My throat was raw. I was wearing a smelly, partly white but mostly stained wife beater known here as a banyan. I couldn’t remember the last time I had actually eaten something substantial; at this point, I was a walking bag of bones, paneer, cheap champagne and dust. I smelt like arse. And I had inserted myself in the middle of this backpacker’s fresh fling purely because I had just spent most of three days talking to myself, and I was in desperate need of some overdue attention. They spoke English and willingly listened to me wail about nothing of significance. I had been slurring for hours, but I was visiting Goa in the off-season, so no one really spoke English or could understand me anyway, except for some of the young staff at this fancy boutique hotel I had scored for dirt-cheap online. I came to Goa to party. Pash sexy Indian men that I’d never see again. Scatter my ashes at the beach clubs built on wooden scaffolding with disco lights glued to the rims of the toilet. Dance until the dust filled my shoes, and it was dawn. I came to Goa to lose my mind and relax my shoulders. It was hot. I was always sweating. My stomach always hurt, and I was always by myself with wads of cash I didn’t really know how to use - the locals hustled me, and I let them.
Anyways, it’s 2 AM, I’m blitzed and giving death stares at the wild dogs that lurked behind me - they’ve followed me for ten or so minutes. I wasn’t scared of the dogs in Delhi, but in Goa, the pups scared the fuck out of me. Especially at 2 AM when I was alone, weak, starting to feel nauseous, useless as per and truly lost. I subconsciously unlocked my phone to order an Uber - my hands were dripping wet from the humidity, so it took me a minute or two to get in. Pointless. Uber doesn’t exist here. I tried to sob. I’m either riding the cows just ahead of me home or walking. I thought you’ve really fucked it up this time, Liam.
These weak moments of travelling alone through India for three weeks also made me feel the most stimulated.
Blood sprinted through my body. As if everything I had done in my life up until this point had led me here. Dirty knees, 2% battery, no data left, broken bum bag, and aimlessly walking this winding dirt road with no end in sight, feeling sicker and sicker every second, in the middle of India’s party jungle A.K.A North Goa hoping to end up at my crib with the AC blasting sometime soon. ZING. My stomach snapped. Oh no. omg Liam noooo. Not now!! It’s all coming up; I’m going to be, going to be, going to be, SICKKKKK, not right now, not at 2 AM, not in front of my crowd of adoring wild dogs, oh lord heaven and mercy, not in front of the cows. SPLASH. The three pieces of paneer I shoved down my throat for lunch to line my stomach rushed back up my throat as if to offer me a second serving and a kiss. And there I was, spewing orange and yellow rainbows alone on my knees on this dirt road with nothing but my humour to pull me through. I stood up, wobbled and giggled.
I’ve always had a special connection to India. Literally, it’s in my blood. I’m a quarter Indian. My dad’s half Indian; he was born in Jor Bagh, New Delhi and immigrated to New Zealand when he was 14 with his father, my grandpa Dev (spicy fact, Dev’s my middle name). So, about a month or so before landing in Delhi, I impulsively and very much on a whim decided I wanted to travel through India alone. I scrambled to organise everything and left the duty of telling my father till the very last minute.
ABSOLUTELY NOT!!! My father hissed when I whispered on the phone that I was going to India alone. As per, I ignored him and booked my economy ticket with extra legroom (purrr). I made my own coin now. I needed to leave Sydney. I could feel my personality becoming distorted, obsessing over dumb shit like being seen at certain events or trying to deck my wardrobe out in skimpy twink clothes that really didn’t suit me. I was becoming a cut-out of my environment. A replica. I had to get out and chew something else, push myself to breaking point, draw blood and tears. So, I went. I didn’t know exactly what I was looking for. I just knew I had to do it alone.
I had been to India twice before as a child. I have an entire family there, aunts and uncles, cousins that are siblings, friends that are family, homes that tell stories of my ancestors and roots so deep that I felt so connected to the ground as if it raised me. But. I really didn’t know what to expect.
I think there is something beautiful about letting your guard down as an adult. I’m an impulsive person. I always have been. I trust my gut. If it feels right, I’ll do it. I’ll eat that shit all the way up. As we grow up, we’re taught the importance of stability, but what about spontaneity? Often forgotten but just as important. You have to live in the moment. I don’t know how long I’ll be able to talk to you or if we’ll be able to make memories together, Saucettes.
I landed in Delhi at the end of September, and my cousin, Latika, sent a driver to collect me. It would have been about 11 PM, and I flung myself into the backseat of his black sedan after standing in line at customs for what felt like days. No seat belt. No worries. The air was so thick I gulped. He gave me some lukewarm bottled water, and we drove along the highway. As my ballbag eyes looked out the rolled-down window, I was immersed in the organised chaos. This subcontinent has a chaotic rhythm that is impossible to articulate.
India taught me that there is more than one way to live. I’m an organised person; I have slight OCD. I make sure my door is locked four times before I properly leave my house. I’ll even demand that the Uber turns back just to check it again. In India, you have to let it go, trying to control this city so it works with your internal processes so that you can make sense of everything will leave you broken.
But the country is alive. And you are alive. You leave your house and are immediately faced with the harsh realities of a different life. One we’re not accustomed to in the Southern Hemisphere. The disparity between the rich and poor, the divide, is so confronting. All I know is that as a child, when my parents used to nag me about being grateful for what I had, my bratty blood would just boil. How dare they tell me to be grateful for something I was born with? It never made sense to me. I always wanted more. I had an insatiable hunger for something else. Whatever I had was never enough. And in turn, I created this internalised feeling of being perpetually unsatisfied. And I think we all do it to ourselves. We spend so much of our lives looking at what others have, what others are doing and feeling and where they are going, comparing ourselves to people online and IRL. These comparisons, these feelings of never being enough, they’ve slowly but surely built up this false reality that there is only one way of life, an impossible standard that’s left us all empty.
You have the career you want. A warm home with three rooms, a balcony with afternoon sun and a backyard for your two healthy kids to run around. The air is clear, and the water you drink is always clean. This cookie-cutter approach was debunked for me on the streets of Delhi. Because in the pursuit of understanding, I witnessed people who had nothing except what was on their backs at that exact moment so happy I could feel it beaming like a light off their bodies. Engulfed in their fearless energy, I let it seep into my pores. They shared the secret I had come looking for as they grabbed my forearms, pulling me in any direction they could. This energy can only be felt here. Happiness isn’t created by what you have or have done; it’s within you, waiting for its moment when you let yourself feel it. So many people hadn’t a scratch of what I’ve been raised with throughout my life, and here they are glowing, beautifully, unlike I’ve ever felt before. As if none of what I had learnt to prioritise ever mattered to them. Everything they needed was here on the streets. A home. Their family and friends. A job doing whatever they wanted to pass the time, and enough food and water for the day. Laughing, sleeping and smiling. Of course, a deep sadness here still gives me the chills when I think about it. Like the children who won’t have the opportunity to educate themselves and potentially pursue their passion that lights that fire inside of them I just know they were born with. The homes that don’t have roofs, weather that breaks people. The ability to run away. The chance to switch off the noise. These luxuries I had never considered as anything more than what I deserved were never afforded to them; it taught me the actual definition of gratefulness. I used to think it was an emotion delegated when something new happened that I should appreciate or honour, but I was inserted in this Earth from a different angle. I learnt that it’s not a nagging feeling I need to layer on myself because I was taught so, but it’s something I walk with and need to use as a power to bring myself up and the people around me.
Travelling alone helped me confront some ugly truths about my personality that only I can fix and acknowledge. Here’s some unsolicited advice for you. Suppose you want to heal yourself and remove behaviour patterns that have left you feeling like anything but yourself and alienated the people you care for most. May I suggest disconnecting from the world and spending a chunk of time alone in a new environment that will push you. Because when you break, which you will, you will see how your mind heals your body. You will notice what you are drawn to when you are empty. What fills your cup. When you feel so far away from home, and your North Star is all pollution, when you’re crying in a train station because all you want is someone to experience that exact moment with you, you will think about the people you truly need and love and places that ground you. It will help you understand the pieces of your life you need to hold a bit closer. Perspective. Travelling through this country broke me and resculpted me every day.
There is resilience here that you can only learn if you grow old here. This country’s chaotic, and its currency is love. Because India will keep spinning. The divide will grow wider. And people will learn how to adjust and be unapologetically happy. Unbreakable with nothing but their spirit as a shield. Shashi Tharoor words it perfectly: "India is not, as people keep calling it, an underdeveloped country, but rather, in the context of its history and cultural heritage, a highly developed one in an advance state of decay”. This country retaught me the definition of family. The way my cousins and newfound friends poured their souls into mine to try to show me a different way of life. Helping me open my eyes. People I hadn’t seen since I was nine were holding me tight as if we were walking together through a burning house. India mattered to me, and I would like to think I mattered to India.
India is so rich in history. And it’s often shared by the elders. You just have to listen. Your parents teach you what their parents taught them, and so on and so on. It’s how information that’s considered fact here is passed down and seeded through generations. There is an underbelly, an understanding of truth that fast-growing love dies quickly, and what will survive the test of time has to be nurtured and cared for and often already exists if you just look for it.
And this concept of slow love and nurturing what you love is what I will take away from this year. For me, 2022 has been about being there for the whole journey, whether I’ve wanted to be or not. When the destination is unclear, when I have no idea where the fuck I am going, when my whole life is precarious and I’m awake at 1 AM on a school night ripping through Dunhill Reds in my bed alone as my mind scatters the globe wondering about all the places I might have been or people I might have fallen in love with if I made a series of different decisions. I snap out of it as the ash drops in my eye. But I’ve stayed in one place this year. I’ve had laser focus. I’ve been building my own tiny kingdom around me that I can only look back and smile at. All I’ve known for so long is how to speed it up, cook it quicker, make it go faster and faster. Because I thought if I wasn’t sprinting, then I was walking. But being slow isn’t weak; it’s rather about taking the time to be precise. When you slow down, everything you are chasing will come around and catch you. Taking your time and investing in the things that deserve your love at every stage of growth, seed to bloom, digging your toes in the ground until it hurts, standing in the storm alone and waiting for it to pass is how you learn to love something from the inside out.
I was sitting on the train from Agra to Delhi at 7 PM, my bum glued to the plastic seat from all the sweat after running around the Taj Mahal all afternoon. I had purposely caught the night train back to my family home and watched the intimate pink sunset across the villages we glided through. I was listening to Best Worst Year by STRABE on my black Bose Headphones; I was smiling at anyone who caught my eye in the carriage. All the hairs on my really hairy arms raised, and although I was a million miles away from anything I had known, I had never felt more at home with myself.
Words — Liam Sharma
