A New Flâneur in Town

I've always been engaged in people watching. I've tried to trace back and place this particularly amusing- if not entirely peculiar- avocation in some formative part of my childhood, only to have failed miserably. Perhaps it's one of the perks that comes with the whole package of being a reserved person, someone who'd keep herself amused by watching the quirky ways of her human counterparts. Whatever the case maybe, all I know is that there's no greater source of pleasure for me (apart from reading and writing, duh!) than catching a glimpse of the everyday lives of strangers, if only for a little while. 

And that brings me to the title of this post. One of my favourite words from the ever-burgeoning lexicon of the English language and recently discovered title for yours truly, 'flâneur' is an awesome term for a soulful urban wanderer. Your average Romantic soul, someone who strolls the streets of cities to savour the sights, the sounds and the ragtag crowd of bubbling, bumbling common folk. I fell in love with the word the moment I heard of it in Phil Cousineau's article for the Huffington Post. And in case you're wondering, yes, I'm a self-confessed geek for anything literary. Gotta love words! :D

Well, what makes this title so endearing to me is the unassuming nature of the flâneur. The guy doesn't want to be savoured by the city or be recognised as one set apart from the crowd. He wishes to savour the city in all its artificial glory instead,  wandering around town at a leisurely pace, taking in breaths of life from passers by and wondering what it's like to walk in their shoes for once. 

And so it is with me. When I'm walking in the over-populated streets of my district in Kerala, that's all I do. Walk miles and miles on my own two feet but with different slippers provided to me by the distinct faces in the crowd every other mile. I am a lady in a long, flowing abaya bargaining with the street vendor once, and then I turn into the bony, frail man stooping like a sandstone arch over what little he has to offer in a makeshift shop with a shattered, tattered tarpaulin for a roof. I become different entities, different souls as I wander the streets of this place where everyone is really just trying to secure a space of their own. 

And as I identify with random strangers trying to make a living, trying to push through the jostling crowd to meet their personal ends, I become one with the crowd, one with this mass of people I have never seen and will never see again in life, and yet it feels just right, like I fit in perfectly somehow, like a clasp on button on a vintage purse. 

 Flâneuring (who says you can't make up your own words?) my way through the streets, I realize I love the smell that the wind carries of floral fragrances, scents of delicious Keralite cuisines floating above the people as invisible but just as existent as the smog around them, the incoherent chatter of people as they whiz and trail about to meet their materialistic destinations , and the very essence of a world of differences living together in comfortable harmony. 

Watch out, folks. There's a new flâneur in town and she's not afraid to stroll about, seeking pleasure and inspiration  in the mundane activities of a vague, crazy crowd. :)