The journey and more...

Writing from the bank of beautiful Hudson River, with tall Manhattan skyscrapers looming large on the other side.

Journey with Air India was very good with excellent indian food and nice service, and indeed with a lot of interesting events. It all started at the plane entrance, with all Gujratis and other fellow Desis people mobbing and flocking the "plane conductor" even when he was pleading to have a sit just like we see on any indian 'SHT shtand' :o). Even if I checked in FIRST in the plane and so had received an isle seat, I relented to a request from a gujrati family to exchange the seat, ending up on a crampy window seat, the decision I didnt regret later on. I was blessed with 5 Gujratis around me, giving it a feel of Ahinsa Express I usually board to visit my sister at Bharuch. The flight attendants (the word "hawai sundari" is lot better I feel :p) in Air India look really smart with their tight-fit Saris and neatly made up hair. Though there was a TV set "specially for entertainment of all Air India customers", it really sucked, except for the movie 'No Entry'. My neighbor was a middle aged gujrati nurse, with the green card power, making her confident and egoistic, though it was a fun to observe her attitude. I came to know
about an interesting fact about Gujrati community in US, because of her. They have a division based on districts here...like Mehsana district usually owns grocery stores, valsad district owns video libraries and so on. Whatever may humanitarians and secularists do, the castism, the desire of man to distinguish himself, will not end. My other neighbour was a B1 passenger who has his own pharma company in Hyderabad, but I came to know about this only at the end of the journey :o(. Rest of the time, he had his Bose headphones attached to his iPod.

Ascent and Descent of the plane were easily the most exciting rewards of sitting at the window seat. Especially, the evening when our 747 (named Konark) descended at NJ, it was a fantastic scene. The plane and the sun were going down simultaneously, ending the race that began nearly 24 hours before, at bombay on the same day, with Sun winning by a very narrow margin. A number of jets were engraving the beautiful evening sky with their characteristic white tail, with lights coming up in manhattan sky scrapers to complete an amazingly challenging canvas for any competent painter. Though not painting skills, I wish I had at least a camera, to capture the glimpse of the picture, which my words are so feeble to capture.

Though clearing the immigration and customs was smooth, the journey ended with just a little bit of chaos. As the plane was late, the cab driver supposed to pick me up had ditched the appointment and left. Good that I had some numbers, so I could call up one of my client's senior managers, Ashish, though finding change for calling up was another sizable task. Ashish was quick to act, as he always is, and came driving right at the airport, to put me neatly in a cab and send the cab driver with proper instructions. Very few people working in software industry will have this luxury in their lives to be received by their client company's manager, who is at least 5 grades higher than them. I realized that day why he has gone up so quickly in his career…by taking responsibilities that were not meant to be his!

Today, it was another fun filled day, when I visited the famous, Desi, Journle square and the Jazzy, Showy Times square. But story about it in the next edition, as the jet lag is making my poor little eyes drowsy and watery. Gooood night…