In the first part of this long essay, Amandeep Midha—known to readers of this magazine as a keen observer of geopolitics—turned inward to revisit his formative years in the terror-ridden Punjab of the 1980s and 1990s. In this second installment, he narrates the opening of a new world: first during a three‑week stay at his aunt’s home in Delhi, and later through his move to Bangalore in 1999 for higher studies.












