NCR #3611

I didn’t come here as someone strong.
Just a kid after 12th… carrying more confusion than courage.**
Delhi NCR wasn’t a city back then, it felt like something too big…

too loud… too fast for someone like me.
But slowly, these roads stopped feeling strange.
Crowds stopped feeling чужे (means Unknown or strange).
And somewhere in between metro rides and sleepless nights,
I stopped feeling lost. I didn’t just live here… I went through things here.

Demonetization chaos. Covid silence. Fever(Dengue) nights.
Job stress. Loneliness that didn’t have a name.
Home became a place I visited. And this…
this became where life actually happened.

10 years.

Sounds small when you say it.
But it holds versions of me
I don’t even recognize anymore.
And now…. Another city.
Another beginning. But this time it’s different.

The fear isn’t loud anymore.
It’s just there… quietly watching.
Because now I know something I didn’t back then—
You don’t really belong to a place.

You just stay long enough…
until it becomes a part of you.

- Shivanshu Mishra(S.B)