Dhruva Almighty

Travelled back to India this saturday .. travelled on Air France and the food sucks !!!! .. good that i had some home made sandwiches with me to satisfy my apetite .. yummmmmmmy ..
(someone suggested me to tell eating preference before flying .. we indians have a typical food taste .. which is not satisfied with most of the foods served by european / american flights .. i was 'adjusting' good till now on all the european flights .. but in Air France food sucked very bad .. I somehow managed while going to US .. but while coming back i planned to 'take charge' and carry my own food .. as i said next time i'll definitely ask for Indian food when I fly ..)

hmphh .. in flight when I said 'no' to the food being served and brought my tiffin of sandwiches applied yummy tomato saus on top of it .. everybody was looking with a hungry look to me .. even the air hostess could not resist smiling when she looked this ..

I was waiting for the bus .. a black man arrives .. a black lady unpacking the pizza she bought from somewhere .. this black man (a college goer i think) looked at the pizza and asked the lady "Mam .. can i have some pizza out of that?" .. the lady looked at him quit normally and said "I am sorry!??" and continued eating ..

the conversation stopped here ..

i still could not understand what happened ??

did the decent looking black man begged ?? if yes, why?? he did not look like a beggar ?? the lady replied as she was expecting this ??!! .. she sounded so cool and not at all surprised in replyin "I am sorry!??" ..

maybe I would understand if i live for some more time in this strange country ..

I was sitting at the bus stop waiting for my bus .. when this young indian couple arrives .. they look at the schedule and map posted at the stop .. and started discussing with an american girl sitting there about bus routes / bus passes etc ..

A bus arrives on the scene .. most of the ppl standing on the bus stop gets onto that bus including the american girl whom the indian couple was inquiring ..

few minutes later these words i hear "aee .. abki tumi jigesh korbe .. dekho mey thake - to aami jigesh korle naa !!?? .. tumi hamesha eta hi korche .. aami jaani na .. sheta chele aache .. tumi jigesh kor" .. (sorry for my poor bengali .. this roughly means that .. "hey .. now you would ask .. last time it was a girl so i asked !!?? .. you always do like this .. i dont know anything .. this is a guy .. so u'll have to ask) ..

hee heee .. these poor people did not know that i have lived four years in bengal and can understand most of bengali ..

i really could not help but smiled and looked at them .. to which both of them smiled back as they understood that i have understood what they were talking about ..

ok .. this is a controversial topic .. but lemme put down my 5 paisas on my blog .. what i saw and what i felt in my first three months at US ..

to start with i think the racial divide is quit visible here .. you see one job profile or some area of life is being dominated by one skin-colured ppl ..

for example i have hardly seen any bus driver other than black ..
even the commuters are also mostly black .. so the impression that i get is all white ppl and no black ppl have cars ..

if i try to list them based on the profiles i think it would like following in decreasing order ..
white collar jobs (managers) - white ppl, brown ppl, black ppl(1)
white collar jobs (engineers) - white ppl, brown ppl, black ppl
bus drivers - black ppl, white ppl, brown ppl
cab drivers - brown ppl, black ppl, white ppl
bus commuters - black ppl, brown ppl, white ppl

when i get on a bus early morning during office going time - it is full of black ppl .. first few days i felt a little comfortable but i think now i have got used to it :)

other thing i have noticed is that many of fellow engineers who have come to US on short term fear a lot from black ppl .. i was told many stories of being mugged up .. so was suggested not to travel & all in US !!!! .. and i was a little scared in the beginning .. but now i think that the situation is not that bad .. it is actually not at all bad .. it is as good or as bad as any country .. accident is accident .. so if it is bound to happen it would happen with you regardless of whether u r in US or u r in India or u r on MARS ..


i think black ppl are really cool .. the way they talk & walk (which is exactly like i hv seen the RAPpers & all :) .. yo yo yo yo ) you really cannot think of another word but 'cool' to describe them .. this one black manager i know .. when he talks or assigns work he simplifies it a lot using simple & plain enlglish - without any technical/functional jargons which white (& even brown) ppl are quit fond of using ... he takes pressures of you asking thousand times that do your work cool-ly and if any roadblocks you get just let me know and I would follow up for them .. he doesnt give you deadline but asks for estimates and accordingly plans the project ..
maybe this has to do with his managerial skills and nothing to do with his skin colour but i feel both has close connection ..

to end this post, you can watch some real hillaaaariiiioousss comedy videos on cross cultural things at following google videos ..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2579833089500205658&pl=true
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2711169459443771195&q=indian+comedy&pl=true
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-107100689292745836&pl=true

(4:30 am EST / 2:00 pm IST) My alarm goes on. I wake up and switcth my laptop on. Rajeev, Rekha, Bhanu & Team is online - everybody is stuck in some problem - everybody have lots of questions and immediately starts asking from all directions ..

(5:00 am EST / 2:30 pm IST) I bid everybody goodbye for now and starts getting ready for the office.

(6:00 am EST / 3:30 IST) I leave for office.

(6:45 am EST / 4:15 pm IST) I reach office. Logins to the system. Again Rajeev, Rekha, Bhanu & Team continues with the questions I left midway in the morning.

(8:00 am EST / 5:30 pm IST) Rajeev / Bhanu has a Status update conference call with Client, Technical team here.

(8:30 am EST / 6:00 pm IST) Conference call with Rajeev, Rekha, Bhanu alongwith 8 memberTeam - No client this time - I train them on tools, systems. Takes their questions, updates on their work progress etc.

(9:30 am EST / 7:00 pm IST) Wrap up the conference calls. Do follow up for Rajeev, Rekha, Bhanu & Team with the team here - if required.

(10:00 am EST / 7:30 pm IST) Start the work which has been assigned to me.

(7:00 pm EST / 4:30 am IST) Finish up for the day.

(8:00 pm EST / 5:30 am IST) Reaches home. Cooks dinner. Eat it. (Eating your dinner also seems like a task now.)

(9:30 pm EST / 7:00 am IST) Mom, Dad, Bhaiya, Bhabhi comes online on gtalk. Have a voice chat with them for around half hour - one hour.

(11:00 pm EST / 8:30 am IST) Some of my friends who have reached earlier to Indian offices are starting their day - saying good morning to me. I bid them good night - sets the alarm for 4:30 - and falls on bed !!!!!!!!!!

ps - If you are wondering about the title of this post .. it has nothing to do with this post .. I was listening to this song while composing this post ..