Ma Vie!

So this is it. New york! Hello all, welcome to my long long oh so long overdue blog. Maybe a new beginning takes a while to blog about!

Am here now, in this moment, in Troy, a small town close to Albany, the capital of the state of New York. Never in my life did I think I'd be coming here! I applied to tell you the truth, just for the heck of it. I hadn't begun dreaming the MS dream until I got this admit. My folks said, " Pooch you apply anyway, we'll see what to do next after that. For now you just focus on your applications. " The whole application process was traumatic. Drafting tens of SOPs and recommendation letters only to draft some more. The most influential piece of advice was given by a cousin of mine who asked me to NOT to go by the concept of "safe schools", which is what I would have done otherwise. He said, why would anyone want to go to a safe school if it weren't motivated by the sole decision of just setting foot in foreign soil? That made perfect sense and to my horror, I realized I had to rethink my choice of grad schools. Oh what tension! I had about a month to apply before I missed the deadlines. Plus, university exams were round the corner. Somehow, I did a lot of soul searching, asked myself a zillion times if I wanted to apply here and here AND here, and did it anyway. That meant, one crazy 6 pm auto ride to Blue Dart, 13 kms away, waiting for my turn, writing in the addresses, fishing out my discount coupons, and finally 2 hours later, returned a tired, weary, angry and confused self. Anyway, the story had a happy ending, or rather a happy beginning, so all the sweat and blood was worth it! What I realized in this gamble was that, the word "practical" holds no meaning in my life. If I had been practical, I wouldn't have applied, because my GRE score wasn't great, my GPA wasn't killer, I ALMOST missed deadlines, I really didn't have it all going my way. I held on to the small ray of hope that said "TRY". Anyway, in the end, it all worked out well, so that's the moral of the story. TRY.

Now am here, in the state of New York, in a state of utter "new-ism". I am trying to embrace the fact that everything is new and different. Each day is a day of adjustment, I wouldn't say struggle, but adjustment. Obviously, if you come to the US, you can't call adjustment a struggle because things are really easy going here. Everything is automated and easy to figure out. That's why living in US is considered a luxury. I can't comment on that much, because I'm forced out of my comfort zone. For instance, the other day, we went to the college union for lunch. I picked up a plate of Nachos and hot sauce. The hot sauce was so bland and the chef said, "careful, it's spicy". I was like, "have you had Indian food?" Of course I didn't say that. After two spoonfuls, I had to literally force it down to make my 7 bucks worth it. Who was I kidding, after 5 mouthfuls, I just HAD to stop. After that day, I haven't ordered anything that remotely looked bland. It was Indian cooking to my rescue! I love my Indian food and spices and my sambhar and rasam and dosas and chapatis, not necessarily in that combination though! Oh am so glad that my mom wrote down recipes in a nice black notebook. I know there are black books for phone numbers but a black book of recipes? Cute! So, that was what I meant by comfort zone.

Ok, let me write a little about my glimpses of a couple of states. I landed in Boston. My cousin picked me up. Boston looked like such a chilled out city. Not too many cars on the road, not too many people on the sidewalk. I was there for about 4 days, filled with many visits of ATT, Apple, Best Buy, Sears. I think that is what any Indian student would do on her first visit to US! Many sights and tired walks later, I left for Troy. It couldn't get more deserted than the Thar desert on a winter night! But of course, our true Indian spirits will always find a fellow Indian to cling on to, and that's how I met many an Indian because it was Independence Day! My prospective flat mate and I went house hunting the next day and sealed the deal with a landlord that very day. We moved in after 2 lazy days! Then began the never ending trips to Walmart and Price Chopper! Thank god for friends with cars and strong hands!! I was fortunate to fall into a perfect friend circle and I don't mean that in opportunistic way at all.

I don't want to bore you with intricate details of my settling in et all. Let me get to the interesting part. The second sunday in Troy, the Indian students organized a trip to Six Flags, Springfield, Massachusetts. And what a day that was. The two hour uneventful bus ride was totally worth it. My jaw dropped the minute I saw the humongous roller coasters! And I went deaf with all the screaming going on around me! Those were my first ever roller coasters and I was thrilled to bits just waiting in the queue to get on one of those! It didn't matter who was around me because it was something I was desperately waiting for since my days back in India where I spent hours drooling on Discovery Channel's "Top ten coasters". I never thought I'd see the day! And then it happened :) I leave the "what I was feeling then" part to your imagination! (Don't forget to let it run wild).

Then came classes and teaching hours. I thought it would be hectic. And I was right. It so is. But am enjoying it so far. It's not yet time to complain. Along came the long weekend, and we left for my biggest dream trip of my life. New York City! It was LEGEN - (wait for it) - DARY, like I imagined it to be. The dirty subways, the typical New Yorker with a coffee in hand, the typical fashionista on high heels, Bloomingdales, petite french cafes and cheap pubs, sun kissing sky scrapers, reflections of perfectly clear clouds on glass buildings, doves in the park, street musicians playing lovely Jazz, NYU (where I almost went), Broadway and xth street, East Village, Wall street, New York Stock Exchange, the metallic bull, plenty of sellers selling I love NY tees and sweatshirts, architecture that left you in awe, architecture that made no sense, Star Bucks at every corner, plenty of residents walking dogs of all breeds, plenty of people who didn't care. All that in just one hour of arrival. Then we went to New Jersey to a friend's place for a while. Can there be a more stark difference between New York and New Jersey? For starter's Jersey is full of Indians, it's literally mini India. But apart from that, it was empty with not many buildings. After we rested our legs for a while, we headed back to NYC. Where else can one go at 10 pm on a saturday night but the one and only epic Times Square! I was at a loss of words. I felt like one of those actors who stands in the middle of the square with arms out and the whole place goes round and round! Although it was crazy crowded that I couldn't as much as stretch out my palm. Many moments of silence and slow sinking in of the realization that we were in the most happening place in the world, we left for some more sight seeing. It was like a sin not to be intoxicated that night according to my friends. I didn't want to be a wet blanket so I dragged along! It was fun to watch people transitioning from sober to tipsy to high! After they drowned a couple of beers and shots, they wanted to head to the next pub. Singing out aloud, holding hands, limping coz of sheer tiredness, we went to the nearest next destination. Unfortunately, the bouncer felt I didn't have a valid ID proof. Apparently I didn't look my age, and wasn't let in. So eventually I did become the party pooper. Gloomily, we headed back to the apartment in Jersey city to get some sleep and because we had a very early bus to catch the next morning.

I woke up with a hang over. A hang over of plain New York-ness. That was my source of intoxication. That was all I needed to get high. I will always remember that first trip to the city. I cannot explain what it meant that I was able to go to NYC on my own. My parents used to tell me, "we're not going to go on a family holiday abroad because we want you to go on your own on a scholarship". I replied saying "Why do you keep such high expectations?" They said "If you badly want to go, you will make it on your own and believe us, you will thank us for that feeling of satisfaction of going on your own". Now I know they are right.

Thank you Papa and Amma for loving me the way you did. Thank you for making me independent enough to be here and to be able to write this tonight.

Absorbing this moment, now and here.


P.S : I didn't edit this a second time, so please excuse any spelling or grammatical mistakes.