Indian Ameri

As soon as you see the title you must thinking that I’m going to talk about the band ‘Blue’… Nahhh!. Just liked the words and it suits the blog a bit J. As you guys must be knowing, my life for the past one week had been real hectic. In addition to the experiments (which all of a sudden am doing full fledged) and the usual assignments (which I still procrastinate till the last moment) and the ever happening fun time, I had something new onto my schedule – write a pantomime story, get the guys running for it, do the songs and the dance sequences and the thinking of other silly stuff. Thanks to my friend Harvind, somehow reduced the whole script to a 5 minute performance for the Lexington Tamil Cultural Association – Vasantham function.
For those who don’t know what a pantomime is, I can take time to explain it but don’t wanna make this blog longer as usual. Go check wikipedia or google video for an idea of what a mime is all about. The story was decided in my ever somber AFM lab while doing my sample analysis. Thanks to the conference I had a week ago I got this file in which I can maintain a calendar and keep a note and some papers. I look professional now. Wrote the story and had songs attached to it. When I said the story to Harvind, he liked the idea and we had some good suggestions about the way the mime is gonna work out. Two days later we had the guys for the practice. After the initial story telling and the usual jolly good moods and comments we decided to go for it.
Next day we had our first practice. I wasn’t disappointed in the way the guys acted but was happy neither. Had the confidence that the juniors can do it. The next 4 days had been a real practice. All the guys sacrificed sleep, food and why not one guy even sacrificed frying nuts in front of girls J. We had a great team. Everyone listened to each others suggestion. There were good critics and comments too. Finally we had everything under our control. The day arrived. We had a pre function rehearsal. Fortunately we had this focus light in the auditorium.
Thanks to our beloved all time Ommale – Ramji, he took care of the lights. Our practice went fine. Then came the big event. Though the drama was a real good one, there wasn’t any proper follow up during the function. I really salute PB and Ramji for their efforts in making the drama. I thought of only one thing. Ours is the last program (or is it programme, crap! forgot my spelling) and I wanted to see everyone go out with a smile on their face and they shouldn’t wipe it for an hour atleast.
The show started. Gave the juniors most of the good scenes to act to show their talent coz I was confident that I could make it up at the last scene where I come solo. I decided to do over acting coz it’s a *#@!ing mime show. Lets have some fun guys. Already in a scene I come as a girl. That was embarrassing before I heard the first boisterous laughter. In the last scene I come as a software pro who has so much work that he looks at his watch to finish his ‘nature calls’ thingy. I did that action and that’s when the crowd came alive. A major hit. I was shameless for one reason, to make people happy, to put that smirk on their faces, to make them use the four chin muscels to laugh rather than use the 32 forehead muscles to frown (I guess this is too exaggerated).
The applause was good, followed by the behind the scenes slide which I prepared when the program was running. It had slides covering every part of the program and everyone loved it. Once the function ended, everyone congratulated every other person and to my surprise everyone congratulated for taking that risk. One uncle (he was in his mid 40’s) said that “your depiction of the work load in US really apt”. I was happy that everyone left the audi with smiles in their faces. I still thank the team for making the show a great event. All this reminded me of the shows which I performed back in the colony where we lived. This is not the person people here knew.
Some were taken by surprise. Brian was there. He said to me “Hi I am Brian. You look similar to a friend of mine named Hari”. Things are turning pretty good from my side. We signed confidence for the show, we sealed the fears and the doubts behind us and we delivered success before a crowd filled with 32 teeth.
November 5th diwali – here we come. Got a great team to perform. Got our ‘453 Woodies’ to continue the sequel of the one we did in freshers party. Press Ave’s are also expecting a mime from us. This is gonna be different coz this time we are going to face a multidiverse crowd. We cant even use hindi as the basis coz keralites and most tamilians aren’t aware of the songs. Its gonna be based purely on music (that’s what I guess). Got to start working for it tomorrow. As for today its woodies turn to see hyderabadi nawabs and make a parody out of it.
I wish I can make the solo event I am thinking off……. Sorry guys, need to leave now… My conical flasks are cracking, the solution is broiling hot on my delay and my spatulas clattering. Experiments are making an experiment out of me….. Cough! Cough! That’s the fume… got to reach the fire extinguisher….. got to…… (you can …………..)

Just like usual I was going through mystery.com page and had this detective question with a photo showing evidence. The picture showed a staircase with footprints completely seen (just like u see when you step on a mud and walk on a carpet). They had two suspects one guy said that he saw the killer running in the stairs but couldn’t recognize his face. The other guy said, “I was asleep”. The webpage asked who the killer was? It took me a couple of seconds to say that the guy who saw the killer was telling a lie. Wanna guess it… it might be hard coz am explaining you guys without the picture. As I had said the stairs showed complete footprints.
Have you guys ever noticed how you climb a stair? You never put your whole foot on a stair. You keep only 70-80% of your foot. Now why the hell am I telling you this… Ahhh! Now I got it. After watching this page I had this question in my mind. How do I climb stairs? I went to the stair near my lab. I just let my legs do my work and my eyes watched them. Little then did I realize that I climb three stairs at a time. Arrrggghhhhh!... I used to climb only two at a time for the past 6 years. I still remembered the day when I started jumping two steps at a time instead of one in my school. I had this friend with whom I used to race by climbing 4 floors and that’s when I had this habit coming. Now I don’t remember why I am climbing 3 steps at a time. While I was worried when I reached the 5th floor of my building I decided to climb down and presto I keep my right leg on the first stair and from then on I skip a step. It’s as if it had become a habit. I tried to focus in such a way that I skip the first step and go directly to step two. But I can’t. I still use the first step and then skip one after another from then on.
Was freaked out and looked into the web for this phenomenon and got this crazy thingy. Gym trainers recommend climbing two steps at a time for better hip strength. Scientists say that it’s the left part of the brain that does this transformation for skipping steps. They say that our eyes focus on the next step, but our brain makes up the previous step as an imaginative lattice/solid (that’s what it said) and sends signals to our leg to stretch further. A Polish psychiatrist presented in a meeting that this is a sign of hyperactivity (what a find, everyone knows it), in which the subject isn’t satisfied with challenges he faces (now that’s bullshit, I can’t go for more challenges) and long time dual climbing makes a person take risks in life (Finally something I can believe, Hey come on I do take risks).
I wasn’t happy with this find coz I din’t get much about climbing 3 steps at a time from the web and so decided to quit on this topic find. And it was time for my pantomime practice in nursing building. Unfortunately the place was near my department and so decided to walk to the place. On the way near the robotics building I had this sequence of stairs having 5 and 6 steps respectively. Since I was thinking about my practice and as I was late I did this fast walk and to my surprise unintentionally I jumped the 5 steps and 6 steps real fast. When I was in the air for the second sequence (the six steps series), a flush of memory about the stair phenomenon came into my mind and I said “Oh Ooh”. Fortunately I did land fine and walked further shaking my head till I reached the next step. What happened next is to the reader’s discretion.

Ambling along the path,

My hands felt the cold

My knees felt the softness

My eyes longed for the texture

My heart raced for the color.

.

I was left alone

Little did I know what loneliness meant

Din't know what opportunity was

My mouth watered.

A curve appeared in my toothless face

I made a gurgled sound.

.

My arms and legs gained vigor

I raced,

I reached;

My hands had its own mind

It stuffed me

There were none to say 'No'.

.

I felt it coarse

My tongue rolled

My mouth spit

My eyes followed my soiled hands;

My forehead frowned

My eyes teared;

.

I looked up searching

There were none

I mumbled in my language,

None heard it;

Instantly I had this cry...

The cry of a wailing child.

.

It was heard

There she was

I recognized her

In my 'gaga gu' language

I cried Mommy...

.

She came

She cuddled;

I showed her my colored hands

She looked at me

Her hands wiped my mouth

Her face showed a concern

I saw this strangeness in her face

She noticed my puzzled look,

She smiled genuinely

And golden words came out.....

.

My son, Don't cry

For what you had done;

But smile

For what you had eaten;

It is the soil.........

Of your first mother......

"Mother India"

.

My eyes stopped watering

It sparkled clean

My smile returned

I looked at her

She gave a kiss

And cleaned me.

.

I never questioned

Coz I did understand

What.......

"Mother India" meant to me!

It meant infinity

.

Now....

After 23 years

I know what opportunity is

I know what loneliness means

I know what soil is

.

But.....

I also know how happy,

How fullfilled

My heart would be

.

When....

When I kiss my Mother

"Mother India"

When I land in Her arms.

I long for that moment,

Which would make me

Proud enough

To shout to the world

"I am a son of Mother India"

Never had I been so confused when I woke up on last Sunday thinking about the following week. I was sure that everything’s gonna mess up real tight. But it wasn’t as I had expected. I called my parents just as every other weekend and was speaking with my mom. I said to her that it’s going to be a real hectic week after all. Dad overheard this and immediately replied that I should stop worrying and he reminded me of how I used to schedule my stuff back in India (wrote this big timetable when exam season comes for 2 weeks and won’t follow anything in it). I laughed in the phone and said to dad that I need a memory that could be used as a scheduler which can arrange itself to my duties and also be compatible enough, that it would make my body take the beating. Dad gave me a advice. He said use the paper which u use to do stuff as ur scheduler too. Presto! I now have a scheduler under my disposal. It did help me out a lot.
Just as I had expected the week was pretty stuffed with loads of work and assignments. It was a busy but fun filled week. I was stressed to a level that without my knowing I was dancing in symphony to my mp3 player in the lab while doing my experiment. The best part of the week was when I ride my bike to (a lot of unexpected) places. Winter has set in and yet I rode my bike with sheer happiness. It reminded me of my driving back in India (rash driving with my Victor). When winter sets in heavens shall rain success upon u – my orkut fortune one day. One evening when I was standing in a signal this mid 40’s lady looked at me and smiled coz I wasn’t wearing any gloves (it was cold). Don’t know what came over me, I went fast and parallel to her car for atleast 100 meters and then I turned real fast in a corner that I went the wrong way. Fortunately there were none on the other side. One fine evening I had fun with my bike when I jumped from a stair near my department (had 5 + 6 steps). No words to explain the stuff I did with my bike.
I have been doing so much work this week that I had on an average 4 cookies as my lunch for 3 days. Wednesday I was so hungry that I decided to go have some desi food in banana leaf. While going I felt lonely coz there were none to accompany for lunch. But the loneliness went into dust when I saw this accident (strange eh, how come an accident changed my mood.. no clue) of an Indian uncle and an Italian. It wasn’t a major one. Just screeching of tires and banging at the sides. It happened in front of my eyes. When I looked at each of their faces it was really interesting. The Indian uncle had his mouth in an O shape. He was looking back and forth (I guess he was analyzing his accident). The Italian was literally dead. He had his hand in his chest and was shaking his forehead. The next thought which came into my mind was intriguing to me even now. I laughed out loud coz I thought about what would happen if this happened in India. I thought about all this ppl making a crowd, the guys lambasting each other and much more. Then when I reached my department, there was this not so old lady waiting for the elevator. When I entered the department, she was waiting and then she was mumbling “why do they provide 3 elevators when none come on time” and she gave up and went to the stairs. She was like 3 steps up and heard the sound ‘Ding’. She ran back to catch the elevator and unfortunately the doors closed again and it went down. I laughed not seeing her misery but by thinking how these ppl blame technology for making them late when they are built to haste their work.
Monday night I spoke with this cute kid of a friend of mine. His name was Avinash. When I asked him “what you wanna become?” he told me, “I want to be a big cartoonist”. I asked him “Why?” and he immediately replied me “Why not?” Those two words made me become his good friend. I instantly spent a lot of time with Avinash after that. Being a kid of 5 years this kid has got imagination beyond his age. I salute this kid.
I had been regularly getting up early in the morning and am starting my work at 9 am now a days. Dipti (post doc) working in my lab wished me good morning today and said to me, “this is the fourth time I am wishing you morning in 4 days”. I laughed and thought about the pride which is gonna kill me soon. 9 a.m is fine. But am still working late nights for my experiment. In the past 2 weeks I hadn’t slept for more than 6 hours. I missed my weekend sleep coz I had gone to smokys. That’s were this sudden transformation appeared. Everyone in the university knew that I go late to my lab and that my day starts at noon. I wasn’t embarrassed coz I still do my work. But this world needs achievers and more than that, achievers who are in the eye sight of the world. So I decided to go for it and am still getting up as I promised my friends. I just wonder how long can my body cope up with this sleep deprived period. I learnt one more thing during the trip. Communication is vital for achieving. I went with guys mostly from Maharashtra. So Hindi was the fast language. We had this antakshari when coming down chimney tops and I felt a fool not coz that I dint know old Hindi songs but coz I wasn’t great in expressing the songs.
Some of the friends in smokys are still under a misconception that I don’t socialize much and that I love my camera only. I’m a puzzle to myself. How come I expect others to understand me? Anyway I posted some pics in my orkut profile and got this load of laurels from friends, from relatives and even from some fellow photographers in flickr. But I still consider myself as an amateur and that I don’t do it for money or laurels. I do it for understanding myself. This hobby of mine is changing me into a completely different person. I was sarcastically called the department photographer by many. Later did they realize that no profession or hobby is to be taken easy.
Things I cursed myself this week were when I missed taking pictures of this guy who was moving rubble from his building and dumping it in trash. He had this yellow colored worker gloves, an apt colored apron, a contrasting cart and a shovel. I had to leave him to his duty so that I can attend my class. It turned out that my proff was ten mins late and so I went down to get a pic of the worker and I missed him. The same day when I was returning from the public library I saw this man in his 40’s wearing a thick ankle long black coat. His top two buttons were open showing his suit and tie givin a clear picture of his business and he was waiting for his dog to poop. They were on a grass field behind a church. If u don’t consider the poop, it’s the best possible scene I had come across for a picture. I stopped my bike, opened my bag, took my camera case, took the camera out and focused on the subject. All of a sudden he waved his hand to someone on the other side of the street (guess his colleague), let the rope loose and the dog just ran to the other end of the lawn. That’s it he called it and both met again outside the lawn. My snap was incomplete. It was real hard on me. The one mistake I did during this snap was, I had a dilemma of whether I should take this picture though knowing it was a good opportunity. Now I have decided to take snaps at willing.
I had been so occupied with my work and hobby that I forgot about the approaching mid term. On Wednesday after the class Nitin asked Dr. Puleo, “Does the exam on Monday deal with only the second set of chapters or does it include portions from the beginning”. Immediately I asked Nitin, “We have an exam on Monday?” I was completely taken by surprise and Dr. Puleo looked at me and smiled. He said to me, “Just don’t be late for this exam”. Man I was embarrassed, but also a bit proud coz this is the first time in my life I had forgotten about an exam. Seems like I had been workin too much. I decided to take a break from routine and so decided to go somewhere. Since my bro has my car and none were interested to go out, I took my bike (yep, it’s the bike again) and went downtown. I went to this parking lot near the chase bank sat at the top and watched all the vehicles going under my feet for half an hour. Disregarding the pollution I must have been exposed, I had fun.
My direction on the LTCA pantomime started fine until I met the actors. Two of the guys were great, but the others lacked the spirit but not the talent. I am quite positive that I can make them do what I imagined. Because of this I missed being in the folk dance and when I saw the practice of the folk dance I decided to dance at the backstage and had fun yesterday. I came home had fried rice from a Chinese restaurant and fortune cookie turned out to be “Dance as if no ones watching” (Coincidence? May be).
Things that were strange about others during this week were a) my roomies and juniors were browsing vehemently thro ebay, deals to buy and other sites and were talking about which laptop was best. One moment everyone were talking about PDA’s and other sophisticated technologies. I laughed out loud and everyone stared at me. I said to them, what did you guys do back in India when ur system slowed. My best buddy understood, smiled and said “I used to rub my RAM using an eraser”. Everybody laughed and we had a great talk about the geeky stuff we did back in India to technology. Things like putting sugar in ur friends fuel tank, stuffing the exhaust with rotten tomatoes, taping cellphones batteries, leading out cable from your neighbors TV, etc … it was fun. The other strange stuff I felt was b) there is this big advertisement and drive for a CRY walk. People have responded really big and since the committee is comprised of Indians many Indian students have lend support for the program. These were the same guys who never did anything back in India with the money they had. I was proud in remembering my buddies near my house back in Chennai, anna nagar where we gave our money and time to make children 10 years younger than us happy in Banyan ashram. I thought about the words my proff in undergrad said “Just give 2% of your salary for good cause”. So far I’ve been in US for 1 year and 2 months. I am well on target of my plan of utilizing the 2% money for my fellow brothers back in India. People say its not great to show what you have donated. But I say for the current community, to drive donation we need to show off so that atleast coz of jealousy and competition people would do something for the society.
Finally things I had learnt other than research this week were - why fall colors occur, why fog appears in your glasses when you enter an ambient room from the winter cold, why do eclipse pictures reveal a shadow when seen horizontal and show the image when seen at an angle. The most crazy thing I have done so far were – swing on a cold rainy day, close my eyes and ride my bike for less than 3 mins, shut off my car lights and ride at 75 mph in a twisty road, climb chimney tops from the more risky side, going triples in my bike (here they consider it gay) and finally playing blind chess with Morgan. Am running out of ideas. Lets see what life shows me……. Adios and as usual apologies for the long blog and thank GOD if you made till this point.

It had been two weeks that I had updated my blog. Yes just two weeks but the things that happened during this long interim was worth living. There was this strange habit which I developed during this era of realization. I had this small paper (around 7 cm to 4 cm, seems like am doing to much precise research) which I tore from an old notepad of mine. It was a ruled paper on which I started writing something named “To Do List”. The first thing I wrote was a silly one – “need to go to cooperstown ground and play on the swing”. Guess what that was the last thing I did before I came home to write this blog. The best thing is I started swinging around 11 pm and went till 0000 hrs. It was freezing cold outside but I dint feel a thing when I swung in it. Thought about all the stuff I had encountered in my one year of American life. As a friend had put forward “I wasn’t thinking abt the journey of coming to USA but a journey of self realization”
A year and 66 days (improvement 1 – I know the day I live on currently and can remember the day something happened in my life) ago I was a man……. Nahhh!!! Now looking at those days I would say now, that I was a boy who was blinded by the fact that I had my life under control, that I valued my money, that I understood my parents, that I faced my responsibilities and that I respected my profession and my goals. Those four years were a real bliss in my life, but I definitely don’t wanna stay in that same time. From being a guy who did not give a damn about future, spending most of my time playing cricket (after bunking classes), eating pani puri and other chat items in the Univ canteen, roaming the city in my bike at speeds which should have killed me and of course never listening to my dads golden words and finally extracting money from mom with some silly reason; on to a guy being putting 200% of his time on the work in his hands (of course with my ipod blaring in my ears) is a mesmerizing metamorphosis.
Back in India when I went for job in a chemical industry I thought that I had the qualities to manage any kind of a situation. But now I realize that would have been a great mistake. Things that happened after I reached here was a shock in my life – a shock which has given me the strength to sustain life and one day shall help me achieve my ambitions. People reading this blog might think that I had the same problems that any international student would have encountered while entering a new country. If that’s what u think then u r terribly wrong. Language, people, money, even friends is never a problem with me – be it India or USA. I was given a responsibility so powerful that if revealed could be devastating for my loved ones, if left alone will be devastating for the same loved ones, if tried to rectify shall some day be devastating. The only way to cure the pathetic problem clinging on to my throat is to acclimatize myself to the situation and then kill it. For that I need experience of a 40 year old father. The responsibility am bearing is beyond imagination (even for a bollywood director). To make u smile let me put it as it’s exponential to the power age vs age plot (I know it’s a PJ, but you did smile).
I have been under this hell for the past 1 year. I made just one mistake of saying “Yes” to someone and that one word is haunting me every day. I guy being a RA from the beginning of his international graduate life would never be like me. I don’t know why I am saying this, but there had been nights in which I had cried at 4 in the morning fearing my nightmares. But that has paved some good quality roadmap in my life.
Now I am the same guy who has a blog page, one who spends 2 hours on exercise each day, one who has a network of friends once I never dreamed off, one has complete control of money to the cents level (am not a kanjoos), one who decides the future of our family (being the last child), one who’s achieving to succeed to become the sole doctorate in our generation, one who spends quality time with all friends and above all managing the biggest burden any child can get.
The thoughts that came into my mind when I was swinging were the thoughts which I feared the most when I came here. It included thoughts of “Why me”, “why should I take this burden”, “why should I live this devastating life” (but never succumbed to suicide coz that’s the most brave decision any man can take) and much more. I hated God for what he had done to me and my life. But now I know why He did that to me. There is a purpose. A purpose which I can achieve without succumbing to pressures.
The day has dawned on me. Now all I need to do is kill the problem with the insecticide called ‘confidence’ and then utilize the light to grow more and to produce shade to others.
And now for my biweekly update (sounds like my salary day)
1. Winter has set in which I never felt until my lips started to dry. Strange thing is that when I wore shorts to Univ it was freezing outside and when I wore jeans it was scorching.
2. Had missed 30 mins of my mid term and 2 classes by over sleeping in the morning. I finally came over the problem by keeping 2 alarms.
3. Played badminton, racquetball, cricket and basket ball someday of the week and still managed to do some exercise.
4. Had attended two of my good friend’s birthday bashes and had the honor of breaking the egg on their heads.
5. Turned into a brainnibal (like in cannibal eating the brain) to a good friend whom I recently met and am chatting with her most of the nights pouring out my stress on her. Poor girl. If u r reading this am sorry for eating ur brain cells.
6. Attended a conference in Loucon KY and fell into the lake while canoeing. Some guy named Zed jumped into the canoe for no reason and sank it. Had to rescue my buddy Sameer out of the lake coz he dint know how to swim when the boat was over his head.
7. Used my camera in Loucon and most of those pics minted money for me when I kept it in stock photography.
8. Completely lost touch with orkut and the friends in it and am trying to go back to it.
9. Had two midterms which I studied 4 hours before the exam started and still aced them to the proffs astonishment.
10. Had a chauvinistic fight with my roomie when he used the word “Disturbance of India” for no reason. Had to defend my country’s name. It can’t be used in any sentence as you like.
11. Read a book focusing on ethics in engineering and understood what I can achieve with my current research.
12. Did tons of work organizing our symposium and found out who the lazy fellows are in my university.
13. Had my first ever Poster presentation and did well in it though my results din’t fetch me the prize. Got 3 more years to get that award. But the thought before the poster session started was a real boost of confidence for my life.
14. And finally I did sit on the swing and think about my life. Now its time to go and watch India England ICC match. So adios and am happy you lasted till this line reading the blog.