Snow World – Across Time Zones, the World Changes [ III ]

Touchdown in United States of America

I have just returned after watching the hindi movie “Black”. A great movie which tells the story of a deaf-blind girl whose life is moulded by a teacher! As I flew across the Atlantic and touched down the United States of America for the first time, my expectations were totally different. This was a country where many of my friends had settled down and where many others were aspiring to work / settle down. The reasons could be many, but my expectations were that of a country which had to be totally different from India and which offered much more than just the additional dollars offered by a job which was no more exciting that those back home, unless you are in a field different from IT!

The expectations gave way to excitement as I walked through the terminals of Minneapolis airport. Soon I was on my flight to my final destination – Grand Rapids, which is closer to Canada. The entire land was covered with snow and the land was a white mass with black dots moving all across. Only one color dominated the entire landscape – “White” which made the day seem brighter than it actually was! I was present for only a week, but for the entire week it just kept snowing, snowing, and snowing. I was probably in the wrong place and wrong time! There was just no life in the air. All that the town had to offer was a 28th Street, which had everything from all kinds of restaurants to all kinds of marts, hotels, etc.

Yes, this was not the place to validate my expectations, but I had an opportunity to speak to many people and the discussions were really interesting. People (NRIs) were more and more interested in opportunities in India and almost everyone wanted to invest something in India or something that was Indian. People were mostly confused with one set of people preferring to come back to India sooner than later and another group wanting to give more time and see how things materialize before deciding on returning. I was not sure if there was more to life there. I was badly missing the LIFE in India – full of color, options, chaos and spice! I may not be able to define what each stands for but I did really miss being back home.

I was biting my time off to catch the return flight to India. Luckily, I did have some good friends who ensured that the stay would at least be memorable for some very good reasons. Sometimes small gestures could be large enough to define (or redefine) something totally new. Across the time zones, in a land totally new, the world had changed.

Soon, I was flying back into the real life. Jet lags apart, I felt really happy to be back at work, among the familiar faces, friends, family and all the discussions, chit-chats, cribs, chaos, etc. It was weekend time and weekend means something special for our friend circle – having a tea in Paradise Café. As we were having tea and discussing various subjects of interest, the topic of US VISA came up and soon my friends were busy discussing about various types of VISAs and the best way of settling down in US, opportunities there, etc !!

This trip was definitely not one of the most memorable. I just traveled across time zones and all that I saw was tons of snow! There is no much interest in me to blog this trip, and I am in a hurry to just finish this off! Let me put an end to this post with this dialogue of Amitabh in the movie – “Black”.

“Life is like an ice cream. Enjoy it before it melts away!!”