For many of us, a visit to a village means nothing more than a whirlwind trip to some distant uncle's or cousin's farm, green fields, hospitable people and before you know it, back home in the City.

People live in villages. People who are, very surprisingly, like us. People who worry about things like power cuts and taxes. And, even more surprisingly, people who are rapidly changing their lifestyles, or at least trying to, to keep up with the times and be hip.

This sudden reverie has been brought on as I see people getting ready to celebrate another festival that cuts across all lines - of caste, of creed and even religion. The preparations people make here, in one of the biggest cities in the world, seem no different from those that I saw being made in a tiny village of fifty houses a couple of years ago. The gap between the villager and the urbanite has been steadily diminishing, and today seems to be almost non-existent.

With, of course, the exception of ultra-high tech celebrations, of which I will not be a part - thankfully so, and the almost negligible festivities in remote tribal settlements, of which too I will not be a part - regretfully this time, all other celebrations seem to be the same - unhealthy noise and smoke levels, spirits running high, both literally and figuratively, consumption of large quantities of delicacies and of course, the buying and parading of new clothes.

Which should make us think, though I doubt it very much in this noise and smoke - what is it that separates the rural from the urban, the city from the country, except a set of pre-programmed, societally reinforced biases?

Cheers.