My Misadventures in USA -Part II

“I speak American.”
“How is it different from English?”
“English is spoken by the natives of England.”
“Yes, I understand, but how is your language different?”
When asked, “How are you?” we say,” I am good” and they say,” I am doing fine.”
“Anything more, that’s just an expression. I mean, semantically is there a difference?”
“Look here, my friend, we speak American and you ask those darn Brits what’s the difference?”

The first morning breakfast did not make me any wiser about the American way of life, but at least it was the beginning. The Americans are generally happy go lucky kind; take things as they come, not going deep or into the root of anything, quite superficial, which is in a way good and in a way bad.
When you meet anyone, irrespective of the fact that you are total strangers, you are always met with a greeting,”Hey, how are you doing today?” By the time you can gather your breath and mutter,” I am fine, what about you?” the person will be a mile [see, I started talking miles] away from you. But, it’s alright; it’s the thought that counts.

Our training was quite fun, the Americans have a nice way of presentation. It was much less of training but more of an interaction, the deeper understandings being told with lively anecdotes. Of the four days of training we only had a slide show of ten minutes and the rest all were like Hans Anderson stories.
The group was quite diverse, there were four people from Quebec, Canada and they spoke more French than American [English], three guys were from North Carolina and the heaviest among them [which already clarifies that all were overweight] kept on humming a CCR number, and I was the lone Indian and that too a dark one.

The organizers everyday placed a huge box full of Donuts of different types. After having one I realized why “Type One” Diabetes and obesity is so popular in USA, but went on to have more than four everyday and realized that it’s not the fault of the people but the Donut manufacturer, it is so difficult to resist.

Rockford in April was by no imagination hot, temperatures were hovering between three to twelve degree centigrade and a hot steaming coffee was my constant companion. But my friends in the class did not agree with me. While I was helping myself with hot coffee, they were filling their cups with crushed ice. Some chewed on the ice, making an awful noise and running a shiver in my spine, others just sipped at intervals to have the water from melted ice. Later I found that wherever you go and ask for water they will give you cold water with ice cubes. Some things in life are beyond logic and I treated this as one of them.

I was ready for the breakfast on the second day, ordered eggs [there is nothing singular in US, all are big, oversized] to be made nice and easy with brown bread and sausages with coffee on the go. Felt so satisfied. One of the French guys ordered for pancakes with maple syrup. When it was served, it reminded me of “set dosa” served with molasses.

My friend took me for dinner that night. It was a nice place, a sports bar sort of, but they also served the best steak in Rockford. Rockford is a small town and I think there are not much of Indians that live there.
The young bartender was nice and friendly and asked me,” What can I get you for a drink, Kingfisher or Stella Artois?” It was smart of him as it proved that he knows the taste of people as per their nationality.
For the main course I had already decided to try the Sirloin steak with mashed potato. The following conversation followed:
“So gentlemen, have you decided on the main course, the kitchen is about to close in one hours time.”
“I will have the Sirloin steak with mashed potato and ribs.”
“What’s the portion you want, six, eight or eleven ounce?”
“I will go for eleven ounce”
“How would you like to have your steak – rare, medium or well done?”
“Medium, I guess [I just want to eat my cow].”
“Will it be rare medium or medium well done?”
“Simply medium, I mean medium-medium.”
“That’s great; you would like to have salad or French fries along with the steak?”
“Salad, please.” [Please let me have my food, the kitchen will close by the time you are finished with the order].
“What dressing would you like to have with the salad?”
Now, that was enough, I could not take it any more.
“Tahina mixed with Hummus topped with crushed Mutabel.”
This completely unsettled the young man. He has never heard of these Middle Eastern concoctions in his life.
Still he faced up to my challenge and said,” Sorry, Sir, we don’t have those dressings – it does not go well with our salad.”
Now the address turned to a polite “Sir”.
“Do you have Thousand Island or Miracle Whip?” I was complete novice when it comes to salad dressing – but these names I have seen when I had been to Subways.
The bartender almost broke down,” No, Sir, we only have Ranch, Blue Cheese and French dressing and I will serve you samples of all and whatever you like I will serve you more.”
“Thank you; please rush before the kitchen closes.”

It gave me a good feeling to win a small physiological battle, but the steak was one of the best one I ever had in my life.

My Misadventure's in U.S.A - Part I

The Lufthansa flight, which was the first one to take off from Frankfurt to cross the Atlantic defying the dictums of the met department and the volcanic ashes, landed in Chicago O’Hara International airport in the wee hours of the morning. The airport was deserted except for few duty bound officials.
I had my turn in the immigration with a middle aged lady, who wanted to laugh out loud looking at the condition of the passengers but as per the training imparted on her had to maintain a stern face. After taking all forms of prints of my body parts and some frivolous questions, answered by equally mundane answers, she put a stamp on my visa and said,” Have fun.”

By the time I checked into the hotel, The Clock Tower in Rockford, it was around two in the morning and way past my sleeping hours. The lady in the reception handed my two access cards for the room to which I sheepishly asked,” Are they both for the room?”
May be it was a dumb question as she stared at me and said,” Excuse me.”
I took the strength to ask again,” Are these keys to the same room?”
She shook her head in disbelief and said, “Yes, any problems?” No, I realized I was in United States of America, where things are different if not somewhat through [as per them and stupid as per me].

I had been in Gulf countries and realized that they do things completely different from how we do things back here in India. That was contributed by the humorous fact that Muslims do exactly opposite to that of Hindus.
I nearly spend ten minutes trying to open the door, inserting that card, taking it out, waiting for the green light to blink and push the door lever down to enter. I am not a simpleton and it is not that it was by first visit abroad from Jhumritalaiya.
I went back to the reception, expressed my inability to enter my room. By now she was quite irritated; because I found out that I was causing a rift between her and her big fat burger [at two in the night?].
She came along me, after whispering a little sweet nothing to her burger [that meant a big bite] did the same things I did till she lifted the door knob UP to let me in. It was a second welcome to Uncle Sam’s land.

Since I could not sleep I tried to see all gadgets in the room, tried operating them [if it did not work in my way I always tried the opposite and in most cases it worked, they took pity and left the TV remote unchanged – Green button for ON and Red for OFF] and then realized that I was once again in trouble.
My hand phone was telling me to feed her with energy and there was a complete mismatch with the plug and the socket. I had one adaptor for Germany, Britain, Australia and even one for Mocondo, but nothing would go in. It was like a strict no, no without Durex [in America, use American].
Next day, early in the morning, I made my first trip to the famously infamous Walmart [thank god, they are open 24X7] and picked up an “all American adapter for the rest of the world” for $ twenty. My initiations to America were quite costly.

When I came back, participants for the training program were already at the breakfast. A little bit of self introduction and getting to know each other was interrupted by the waitress’s [she was a stout lady in her fifties] wake up call,” Hey, how are you doing today and what can I serve you for breakfast?”
I was about to say, Idli, Sambhar and Chatni separate [I have aligned my taste with the place I stay now] but realized that would be too much to ask for.
Wherever I have been, breakfast had always been a buffet, so ordering from menu was more or less the first time. I usually have a light breakfast of milk and cornflakes and sometimes an egg with a piece of bread.
I asked her if I can have a couple of toasts and an egg to go with.
“What sort of bread would you like – with butter, full fat or margarine or jam to go with? How do you want your eggs to be served and would you take coffee, tea or orange juice? And by the way you need to tell me if you want bacon or sausage along with the egg.”
Honey, you just shrunk me.
No one told me how my face looked at that point of time but I could hear the lady saying,” Don’t worry, Honey – I will get the right stuff for you.”

I was served with toasted brown bread with butter with a small accompaniment of jam, a fresh garden omlette with golden brown mashed potato, three big fat beef sausages and a steaming cup of coffee.
That was one hell of my first morning in the United States of America.

TIME WRAP - INTERNET CONNECTION

Exactly a decade back I was one of the privileged few who had a personal computer at work with an internet connection. In those days to have an email account meant filling up a series of forms, with justification for the need to have an “expensive” mail account, when there were regular mode of communication like telephone, fax or the post. The forms needed to be submitted to the departmental head who in his own great managerial demeanor would sit on the file till you poked him about the same. Then came the monologue which by then was known to any person even remotely connected to our business unit. It came to be known as the “Great Indian Management” jargon.
Without even looking at you, scribbling on a notepad, the great manager would rue about the rising cost, the need for austerity, how receivables are increasing leading to lesser profitability, reduced sale due to lesser demand [attributed to either bad monsoon or severe health problems of anyone in Gandhi family] and self restraint in these trying times.
Then he would look up through his glasses which were just left hanging on the nose and say triumphantly that he is no bigot, he cares for his people and understands that technology is the only way for the future.
That ultimately meant that you will get your mail account in the future which can stretch from few weeks to few months.
Nowadays the same manager, when fed up from not getting the office-boy on the pantry phone for a cup of tea, sends him a text message for the same.

I had just come back from overseas training and the business unit had set a precondition that I should have a mail account and an internet connection for faster communication and updates.
The form for the internet connection needed to be signed by the director of the company, it was even beyond the jurisdiction of the “great” manager who is responsible for the profit loss account of the division. They said it is for greater good and the cost needs to be adjusted across the divisions. At one point the feeling was that an internet connection was more crucial than a couple of senior managers.
Getting the internet connection was after all not that difficult. After the form was approved it took few minutes for a person to hook up a connector into my computer and say,” Open Sesame”. There you are in front of the World Wide Web and hardly knowing what to do.

I still remember the most popular search site was AltaVista [do not know if it still exists] and the first thing everybody worth their salt and an internet connection did was to open a Hotmail account.
I was no different [I was not married then, people generally say life becomes different after marriage].
The best part of the net during those days was that most of the contents were free as most things in life in the beginning are. There was hardly any filter and the greatest demand for the internet was after office hours.
People who started packing their bags at four to catch the bus at five to get back to home suddenly felt the urge to devote more time for the good of the company.

We had the internet connection but the computer we had would have been now an archeologist’s delight.
We calculated that the time taken by the computer to start up was exactly the time for a person to finish a “Will Navy Cut” cigarette.
After hitting the “enter” key by the time a new page loaded you could very well say,” Jawaharlal Nehru liked the smell of Lady Mountbatten’s armpit and she never used a deodorant.”
Gross, but we were acting our age.
We all made these things up, thinking that some day we would tell these stories to the next generation.

We chatted after office hours, made up names, age and also gender in the chat rooms – it was fun and we did it all collectively, not in the solitude, in the remote corner of a room.
I still am in touch with a friend I met on one of the chat rooms.
Ten long years – sometimes you do not even remember how fast time catches up with you.