Hello hai ji sabko. I know what you are thinking. Kahan mar gayi manhoos..pichle ki pichle Friday ko post ka kaha tha and the post and Anusha both are nowhere to be seen. Der aaye durust aaye. This is going to be a long one and not as delicious as I thought it would be. I am a bad cook!
The thing, behnon aur unke bhaiyon, is my company could not tolerate the sight of me any more. They found me totally disgusting and unbearable and decided to be done with me. So they decided to kick me out! They kicked me so hard, that I landed on seat 41A of Delta Airlines flying to New York. The kick was real hard guys. I bounced once at New York and then I found myself in Dallas. (I can already see some hair falling from your head..;-) ). And my ordeal at the passport office, last year, finally became worthwhile.
Not many people had the belief that I would board an international flight someday. As with almost everything in my life, I was late to fly international, when almost everyone I know in IT is at a stage where they are refusing them. “Chalo, finally!” was the most respectable compliment I received and I am not even thinking about all the other reactions people gave! But I think der gaye durust gaye. I know so many people back in India gave a sigh of relief when I left. (May I add that the sighs helped the jet propel faster!) There was no shed of tear at the airport. Of all my nalaayak friends, only Saumya felt the need to make sure that I am really leaving and she did everything to spoil the senti mood my mom was in. God only knows what would have happened if the entire Mumbai crowd had come to see me off. My mom did wanna cry, guys, honestly. Though, I have a strong suspicion that it was not because I was going saat samandar paar, but because she felt that she lost the race to my manager and could not get me married before my manager decided to send me to US.
Life was moving at a very frenzy pace after my Chicken Pox recovery. The kick-me-out date was 27th June and I felt that 27th of June, 2008 would never actually arrive. I was rushing places, trying to wrap up the work in office (one jhooth per post is allowed), giving err, ahem, knowledge transfer sessions, seeing off Ankita, packing for US and packing the stuff which I and Varsha called home for almost 2 years. Incidentally, Varsha has left IBM for good and is in US these days for her MS and yes, you guessed it right, her last working day in IBM was 27th June :-). The day finally came, and encouraged by the readers of this blog, I gave the longest farewell speech ever in history! Does standing on two feet for two hours or speaking continuously for that many hours qualify for an Olympic gold? I wish it did! We would have ended up a little upar on the medal tally.
27th June is a day I am never going to forget my entire life. The last thing that I wanted to do on that date was to board an international flight. Well that it was the last thing I did on that day is a different thing (I had a midnight flight). I wanted to be at a different place, with some of the important relations but I did not even have a phone access. Sitting on the lounge, waiting for the flight, I realized that the things you want in life come to you at a cost. And sometimes, you are not willing to pay the price. I realized in great measure that day, what it means to be with your people, what support systems are, and what so many relations mean to me.
The flight was interesting, the food was good, the movies on demand were great and New York skyline was amazing! I was hoping a great flight from New York to Dallas as well. But domestic flights in US suck bigtime, people! I was hungry and all I got was a sour juice and 15 peanuts to eat. Thankfully Veethi and Vipul came to receive me. They are a very sweet couple who, luckily for me, stay in Dallas. Veethi is Varsha’s cousin and I realized that some of the sweetest people I ever came to know have their names start with V.
I miss India a lot. I miss talking to my family and friends at will. I miss the street food I used to have so often, I miss Kailash bhaiyya ki Pani Puri. I miss the beauty of Pune in monsoons, the time I had with my best friend, the get together at CCDs with the Pune crowd.
The only thing I do not miss is the sight of Indians! They are just way too many!! :-)
Am I happy being here?
Apni marzi se kahan apne safar ke hum hain,
Rukh hawaon ka jidhar ka hai, udhar ke hum hain..
