Life’s Simple Pleasures

I finished the third trimester of my MBA end of May and have taken up a small internship out here. For those of you who don’t know, my university is on a deserted island surrounded by piranha infested waters and everyday getting outside the campus is a matter of life and death (yeah, I am kidding obviously!). Well, jokes apart, the truth is – getting to the business district is a 1.5 hours commute that includes catching a feeder bus to the nearest railway station (yeah I mean MRT) 20 minutes away and thereafter dangling by the handle bar for another 40 minutes inside the MRT, only to get down at the destination station and walk another half an hour to get to the office.

And over the last week I have suddenly realized how relevant Maslow’s theory of “Hierarchy of Needs” is! My quest to go for “Esteem or Love/Belonging needs” has suddenly gone down. Now I am more of the  “trying to satisfy my physiological needs” variety. I derive “pleasure” out of the following things:

• Reaching the bus stop and seeing the bus arriving, without waiting or running for it
• Making a dash for the only empty seat in the entire MRT cabin and getting it before anyone else occupies
• Seeing the signal turn green for pedestrians the moment I reach the intersection
• Getting a seat to sit with my food in the food court the moment I look for it
• Walking into a cold blast of air conditioning from a hot and humid walk outside