How I staved off brain rot: Leaping over Mumbai’s potholes

Over the past year, Scroll has published several reports about scientific studies showing that an agile body helps keep the mind agile too.

Daily exercise doesn’t need a gym, experts say. A daily walk holds great benefits too, researchers say – more so if you vary your speed or ensure that your walk is “eccentric”, which is to say, going up and down steps so that your strikes incorporate muscle-lengthening contractions.

I am fortunate to live in a city in which the municipal authorities have thoughtfully designed routes that force pedestrians to include such movements in their journeys.

In August, the municipal corporation reported that it has detected 16,162 potholes on Mumbai’s streets. At least 90% of those, I believe, are located on the 1.5-km stretch between my home and the Scroll office. Eccentric movement is baked into my walking patterns as I leap over these chasms, or step up high over them.

Sharing the street with unruly drivers has the added advantage of inspiring frequent exhibitions of pedestrian rage, which produces uplifting floods of adrenalin – which, scientists say, makes the mind more alert.

When the municipality announced recently that it would redouble its efforts to fill potholes, I was in despair at losing my daily obstacle course. Luckily, utilities departments stepped in and have begun to...

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