Although I am a self-professed nocturnal, I rarely ventured out in the night. In contrast to the owls that fly away into the dark of the night, looking for prey, I stayed on my branch and hooted happily, every night. Half-awake and half-dozy on my soft bed with the clean detergent-smelling bedsheet and a page turner in my hands, the pages I would have to read again because I read them half-asleep.
But by happen-chance I was convinced by my friend to join them to celebrate a birthday.
I rarely socialize, but I made an exception this time and submitted to this unfamiliar territory called an all-night party.
The party ended at 2.30 AM and we had a long drive back home. Being sober, I had to drive, and as I was driving in the night I would have to be alert.
I reside in Pune, and in my humble experience I find the city to be polluted, her motorists unruly and some parts crowded and congested.
But as I drove through the cold night, the crisp air keeping me awake, I noticed the sudden change in the personality of the city.
The night seemed silent and peaceful, the nightly air cool on my face and for once, it did not smell foul at all. The trees rustled in the breeze and because of the absence of motorists, I could hear the trees rustle.
I had expected the roads to be void of people, deserted, and the lizard part of my mind fantasized about bandits and cut-throats coming out on the streets, looting people.
I found throngs of people sipping chai, I could see the steam wafting from the small glasses.  I saw people relishing poha, at this hour! The smell of the tadka of onions and green chilies and rye and jeera and then the sweet smell of moistened beaten rice soaking in the flavors filled my palate, making me hungry.
The night had a different energy, a different composure. The people were gleeful and talkative. They sat on the footpaths, again a domain of the pedestrians during the night, and chatted away. As I drove further on to the less-frequented streets, the streetlights glowed with a calm yellow glow, with the black of the night at their back.
The motorists, the few I encountered, were relaxed, to the extent that I saw an elderly man driving his moped in a vest and a boxer, the cold air not making him flinch a bit.
I realized then, that the night stripped the people of their inhibitions of the day, where they were free of the judgments of people who could hear their loud talk, and people who would ridicule them when they see them in their underwear.
As I motored on the black roads, street dogs roamed freely. It was their kingdom now, no human to pelt stones at them. They would not be looked down up as the unnecessary and hence they played, chasing each other’s tails in the middle of the road, carefree.
A family of three paused on the side of the road, the mother holding the kid, helping him relieve himself. The father was checking his phone, not really appearing concerned.
I passed so many couples on their motorbikes, the girl hugging the boy tightly, possibly on their way back from a lovely date or a party like the one I had been to.
I saw friends on the motorbikes too. They were raucous and were talking animatedly, their expressions that could be deemed unnecessarily evocative during the day, and their laughs unnecessarily loud for the day.
The laughs were not bound, and they laughed like madmen, their witch-like cackles echoing off the walls and the now-dark windows of the buildings lining the streets.
I also saw a vehicle that had eggs to deliver and I saw a vehicle with newspaper, dropping heavy rope-tied bundles at what I assumed to be pre-determined locations.
There would be people who would come to pick them up and then deliver them to our doorstep early in the morn, but as I drove on and overtook them, I probably will not see them at work.
I found more groups of friends and even families easing up on the footpaths. The ladies in their maxi one-piece nightgowns. The teens were smoking up and sharing their cigarettes, and the families sharing their stories.
I never imagined sharing stories so late in the night, least on the side of the road, with stretched legs and propping myself as a plank with my elbows behind me as a support.
They were truly living the night life. I always thought that night was the dominion of vampires and thieves and rabid dogs. But the sight I saw as the cool night whistled past my ears refuted this prejudice.
As I drove into my parking with my friend dozing behind on the pillion, I could hear the shrill whistles of the many watchmen of the many housing societies, alert and questioning, their whistles a warning, an equivalent of a vocal “Beware!”
And I walked into my apartment, the air suddenly felt very stuffy and I felt constricted. I changed to my night clothes and walked to the balcony.
The apartments on the city skyline looked peppered with lights, some people awake, nocturnal, some people in deep slumber? Construction workers walked on the road back home, after a night of heavy work, smoking bidis, the smoke trailing them, like weightless thin ropes. They seemed blissfully unaware of the unnaturality with which the people perceived the night to be.
How unnatural I perceived the night to be.
The night was as alive as the day, and possibly even more.
Sleep finally caught up with me, dulling the excitement of my discovery and I gulped in the sight of the alive darkness once more and then I crashed into my bed and thought of how tranquil the night was and then thought of the troubles I would have to face the next day.
During the day, it seemed, we lived and during the night it seemed that the people I saw were truly alive.
Do you experience the true beauty of the city after midnight? Share it with us.