Uncle Sam I am Here

After months of speculation and answering the - "abe tu abhi tak gaya nahi" queries from a lot of my friends, I finally announce my arrival here in NY. Its actually a strange experience of looking outside your apartment's window to see America all around, if you get what I mean. There are a lot of Desis as well and who the hell said that every fourth person you see around is a Chinese, its India all the way. Just yesterday I went to the Indian Street and there I was amidst those Paan ki dukaans and the sabzi bazaar.

The flight experience to begin with was again as expected. A 14 hr direct flight brought me here and as luck would have it, I shared my space with a Bong who had been around in the US for the past 5 yrs and a retired Ahmedabad Electricity Board Officer who was visiting the US for the first time to be with his kids. There were no hot chicks in my vicinity and I did not really care. Its almost become a certainty in my life that girls never book a seat within 3 rows of where I sit.

The flight was not without its share of experiences though. I overheard the Bong being lambasted by his wife for not not calling her before leaving Delhi and for waking her up early in the morning just to inform her that his connecting flight would reach Albany by 12 in the afternoon. I helped the retired uncle in filling a couple of forms for immigration purposes. He had a strange habit of filling the 'Official use only' column in every form that he got and I went to the airport authorities claiming that one of my baggages was picked by someone else while my bag waited to be picked at a wrong conveyor belt.

Life in US also means that you get ample chances to show your culinary skills. I tried hard and with minor hiccups got the matar paneer bang on. It tasted okay and people seemed to relish it too. My friend's room-mate brought his girl friend to the house just to let her taste it..I think I'll make a good cook with some practise I guess :)

The first weekend of my 'business trip' to US is over and I still don't know which project I am going to work on. Though I must tell you that the Manhattan skyline looks simply out of this world. I don't think I am going to appreciate it as much from tomorrow I guess when I see it from my office's window. It was such a nice feeling to stand at the same location where SRK stood and sang Kal Ho na Ho and croak until the statue of liberty started to protest against my singing, calling it a scathing attack on the liberty of people who wanted to live in peace. I still felt like King Khan though, the only difference being that instead of Preity Zinta, I had Abhinav Sinha to sing to.

The jet lag is now going but I still feel a bit sleepy during the evenings and wide awake at 3 in the night. I'll be clicking a few pics and uploading them here next weekend. Before I sign off, this too needs a mention. Four of us had a pretty normal Indian Buffet today for lunch and it cost us $12.5 each. I have now decided to go without dinner for the next 2 days to make up for it and in the long term thinking on trying my entrepreneurial skills here by setting up a chat thela or something on those lines. Somebody willing to join me here?