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When a fascist government rules a democratic country, hatred stealthily seeps into the common man's everyday life, like chutney spreading on a plate that makes idlis soggy and weak. The beep of the Namma metro doors opening and the blip of two notifications on my phone arrive at the same time. My walk out of the metro cabin becomes careless as I notice the rectangles on my phone screen: "Your Uber auto is here! Meet Muhammad at the pick-up point". Beneath which - "Hindu-Muslim tensions rise as Ayodhya verdict finally out". My journey from the JP Nagar metro station to my destination is short. My distance from Ayodhya, standing here in Bangalore, is long. Yet, why does a heaviness settle in the pit of my stomach as I get inside the Uber auto? Maybe it is the weight of the gory history behind that headline - a mosque in Ayodhya demolished by Hindu extremists in 1992. Kashmiri Pandits expelled from their own houses in 1990. Years of communal history, decades of sorrow on both sides. I consider my options: the line of green and yellow rickshaws outside offers to cover the same distance with thrice the fare, my inability to speak Kannada becoming a major barrier for negotiation. Uber autos, requiring no verbal communication, are the best option my travel budget allows. Muhammad seems harmless, minding his own business, and my fear weakens. The excitement to reach the Indian Music Experience museum strengthens. Without realizing it, I am humming a few Hindustani classical tunes - the few notes I remember from my one-year stint with classical training four years ago. Bangalore traffic stands true to its reputation - a 2.3km road costs me 20 minutes of time. My empty stomach is seduced by the aroma of appam, idli, dosa and sambhar wafting in through the numerous South Indian restaurants on our way, but my jam-packed itinerary for the day cannot afford a stop. With 13 minutes more of the journey left, I'm caught completely off-guard when Muhammad asks me, in English, whether I'm a trained singer. He probably noticed my apprehensive eyes, and follows this sudden question with an explanation: "Your destination says Indian Music Experience Museum, and you were humming in tune, so I thought..." When I'm still hesitant to make conversation out of fear, he pursues it with, "I'm a trained singer, ma'am. That's why I thought I should tell you about your voice. I am an actor also. I act in the Kannada tv industry....you should catch my serials on Kannada DD". Something inside me bubbles at that instant, and I delve into conversation with my auto-wallah. Soon our mutual love for the arts takes its position as the helm of our charged and warm conversation, and as we cross Ranga-Shankara Theatre he tells me its history. It was made in the memory of Shankar Nag, who happened to be Muhammad's favourite actor. 5 minutes to our destination and I have shared with Muhammad what I refuse to accept in front of even my closest of friends - my dreams. I'm amazed at how easily I accept in front of him that I wish to become an actor and a singer, hearing the words that used to make me feel at my most vulnerable gliding out of me smoothly. He wants to direct a film of his own in Bollywood and tells me he will be making a trip to my city soon, when he's done saving money for the travel. That's why he drives the autorickshaw in the day. He will pray to Allah for my success in films and in the music industry, and he hopes I will pray to my God for him. He pulls the auto in front of the museum, and we part ways after a short handshake, where the Hindu tilak on my forehead and the skullcap on his head smiled at each other, hopeful for a world where both our dreams are allowed to bloom without the hate, fear and division that is trying to pin them down.