Books I'd like to live in

Thanks Jen Robinson, a passionate young adult literature reader and reviewer, for this list. I thought that I was sufficiently well acquainted with Young Adult literature to make it.

3 Children's Books that I Would Like to Live in:

• His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman.
• Island of the Aunts by Eva Ibbotson.
• The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle by Catherine Webb.

3 Schools from Children's Books that would have been Cool to Attend:

• Hogwarts. (A tad predictable what the hell!)
• The Mayfair Academy for Young Ladies from Eva Ibbotson's Journey to the River Sea.
• The Hallendorf School in Vienna from Eva Ibbotson's A Song for Summer.

3 Books that I Like, but would NOT Want to Live in:

• The Bartemeus trilogy by Jonathan Stroud.
• The Eddie Dickens trilogy by Philip Ardaugh.
• Coraline by Neil Gaiman.

3 Schools from Children's Books that would NOT have been Cool to Attend:

• Crunchem Hall from Matilda by Roald Dahl.
• Camp Half-Blood in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series by Rick Riordan.
• Harriet's school in Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh.

It's an open list. Anyone who is interested can take it up.

A different time, a different city, a different window

Moving back into the city where I studied is a really different experience. I wonder, is this what coming home feels like? I have moved back to Chennai. I also quit a rather high-profile job. But it's not for the romantic reason like writing, which I do want to do. Many people I know threw sarcastic comments about coming back (Sample" Oh! So, you gave everything up to come back"?). So it is difficult to come back to where you once where rather than stay in the same place where you once moved. Contrary to popular belief, it takes more courage to come back than to stay away. This is something I would not have learnt had I stayed here all the time.

I don't feel I have come back to the same city. The city feels familiar and different. It's familiar in the sense nothing has changed large scale. But it's different because I still fumble between choosing which language to communicate in (Tamizh or Hindi?), giving directions to the auto guys ("Go via Gemini flyover; I hope it's not jammed at this time.") This is because it's changed and so have I. I still am a bit dazed and disoriented. I still feel like I am a guest here and will have to pack soon and go somewhere. I even had a dream where I was tensed and upset that even though I had packed so many things; there were so many others, which were still to be packed! But I have no regrets.