I was boarded on the Emirates from Seattle to Chennai. The run up to the boarding at the airport was interesting one - I committed some code, saw flocks of families returning to their homeland, kids whose English had taken a swirl and very interestingly how they switch between a good regional tongue to an acquired accent :)
During my trips, I always (atleast) find one curious kid probing their parents for answers, for which their general response would be to feed them or shut them up by making faces. This time was a little different - the parents and the kids were involved in an active conversation of what the trip route is going to be and why this route. I learnt something observing (overhearing) from a distance - essentially, the flight was taking a route closer to the arctic. I did not realize this at all until that moment.
Fast-forward into the aircraft, I realized, I had a window seat. Not very happy about it, given my height and dreading locking myself in the seat for ~14hours, I sat down. The first hour of the flight was phenomenal - had amazing views to my side. Vast spreads of land, portions covered by white layer, deep valleys and different colored/textured spreads of land and water. We touched vancouver, some other parts of canada. Vast expanse of land with spreads of white.
The kind of calibration our eyes in combination with our brains make is amazing. It differentiates between a hard iced sheet from a powdery texture; differentiates glacier water stream from a regular clear water stream and so on. This pushed me to wonder a lot about how we are so myopic about everything that we do - however broad-minded we call ourselves to be. As fantastic the sense organs are - they are also extremely limited when within a context. Constantly zooming out from the context shows how insufficient our sense organs in capturing the broader picture - not essentially, the physical aspects, but, life in general.
Exposing myself to nature, always does this to me. I cannot really express, how limited and ignorant I feel when Im around nature. With so many misgivings and falsehood we run our lives. The laws of the existence dont seem to have any traces of our ideas of right/wrong and yet we mull over and fight over it. The falling snow doesnt really decide which tree it should fall on and which it shouldn’t. This level of complete indiscrimination reduces me to nothing and overwhelms me and shows my place. It’s a great reminder!
Gazing endlessly outside, I dint realize it had been ~2 hours from departure. The cabin crew hinted to me - its going to be day all through and I should shut the window for benefit of others. Back to confines of the aircraft. I watched two movies trying to mimick the same theme - Mt Everest & the Arctic. Of the two - I would recommend the Arctic - if you’ve the patience to watch endless expanse of snow covered plains with one man trying to find his way out.
With some sleep, food and other futile attempts to kill time, I ended my journey.