A sense of desolation - Perth (January 2008)

Walking out of the Perth airport, the first impression of the city was nothing like what I had expected, primarily because I had expected nothing. It was just another small city with an airport that made no impression. Outside, there was the usual crowd of excited faces waiting to meet their loved ones, hotel staff going about their daily routine of picking up guests – with professionalism and disinterestedness noticeable in equal measure, and the familiar queue of taxi cabs waiting to ferry inconsequential visitors like myself for whom no one ever waited at airports. There was one thing that was noticeable though – it was how brightly the January sun shone even at 6 o’clock in the evening “Welcome to the southern hemisphere” I told myself; it was my first time in that half of the world.

As I rode to the hotel, my senses slowly started drifting as if I were splitting into two separate people – my mind was fixated on the string of meetings that were lined up the next day. I was well aware of the fact that the outcome of those meetings would largely determine the fate of my organization and indeed my own self. My sight though was falling upon all that I was crossing and absorbing it all with juvenile curiosity. “How unique the sights of every city are” I thought to myself – the architecture, the well laid pavements, quaint houses with little gardens outside them – I had seen them all elsewhere before. Yet there is something in the way all of it comes together that makes every city one sees so unique. In Perth, there was one thing that was truly unique though – it was the sense of desolation and emptiness. Signs of life were so rare to come by that I was confused whether all this was real or whether I had been transposed inside a painting without my knowing it. Or maybe I fell asleep; the jet lag was beginning to catch on….