The first time i landed on the great land of America, i just felt am in another big metropolitan city of india. The road leading from San-francisco airport to the inner cities were almost identical . but the difference was all the signs !! the directions , the numbers were quite confusing , but considering that was my first experience of america it was an obvious fact .
There was a mirade of thoughts in my mind, though ours was a love marriage , but we never had really spent any time together..as it was this long long distance love story.and though i loved him and adored him a lot , still i felt so vulnerable in the foreign land. the only person i knew was my husband.The roads , The houses, the soil everything reflected altogether a different picture , of which i was not familiar .so with lots of apprehension and anxiety i entered to this fancy new land.
Some weird, some funny, some fascinating things i came across while walking through my great american dream..
The bathrooms..
Now all indians must have faced this issue unless they are highly water phobic or unhygienic that is they don’t clean up after the daily routines 😉
The first time i used the toilet here i was highly shocked .no Mug !! how am gonna wash my self ? to add to my dismay there was no flush button also . no one ever told me that something like this can happen too in america? like i knew people out here don’t use water , instead use tissue paper, but somehow i had imagined that there would be an option to use either of it.
I was so flustered and distressed to the extent that i imagined myself packing up my bag and leaving back to my own water loving country .now after lot of thought ,me and td have come up with our little arrangment on that front.Now thats a secret !! 😉
The roads:
I come from a country which ranks 2nd in population in the whole world, so you can imagine my surprise ,when i saw roads and parks here.Back in india ,you may not find a single car on the road , but people, you can find in abundance everywhere. The first time we went on a drive was the first night we landed here. it was 9pm and not a single soul anywhere!! but all the shops had their lights on, and there were few cars on the roads.i thought some curfew is going around, but td told me its the usual affair here.i come from a small town in india , bhubaneswar , there also i see people doing their normal stuffs even when it’s 11pm at night but here everything closes by 10PM!!..when in the morning we went out to buy some groceries it was the same scenario, only more cars !! Trust me it feels weird !! like am in some ghost town as it’s shown in some english horror flicks .
The Silence:
Same argument i would like to state ,as i am from india where you cannot even hear your own voice sometimes, it was a weird feeling.it creeped me .So much silence everywhere . we go for walks and i keep thinking where are all the people , where are the noisy kids , where is the ear drum bursting car honks ?. till now i keep thinking about the same. the only sounds i hear are mostly what we indians make as usual !! 🙂 . But now am used to all the silence thing.Later anyway i went to SFO where i could find some people , apart from cars!!
The Beautiful parks
The parks and the community centers are some things that kept me in peace .these are relaxing , much less crowded and very clean. the freshness dose i get by just a walk in the parks or a run across the tracks after my long office hours is something which is really amazing here .
The people
I felt mostly people here are very private. unlike india , where we even know the far away living cousin of our neighbour and go for tea to almost any random aunty’s house and many times without any invitation too. but it has its demerits too. people are very nosy and intervening in our society. but guess what we come from a place where everything we do, we wear or eat is scruntinized , so we are used to all the holy mess around us.So it was really facinating to me that how people here are so into themselves ,never bothered on what you are doing. Not for a single day i felt being ogled or judged here for my choice of cloth or the shape of my body !! its refreshing 🙂
The food
Now how much i try , but indian food will always top my list of favorite cuisine .The spices , the color, the amazing aroma when the ghee is splattered across the tawa is something which no indian can ever get out of his senses. but the best part of this place is you can find food from any part of world. within my stay of 6 months i have tried almost 6 different cuisines , each with its own unique taste and flavour. one special mentions are the pastries !! i felt they are out of world. the cake so soft , so creamy . The sweet tooth of mine makes me helpless in front of these beauties. 🙂
Fashion
Now this is something every indian girl dreams when first time they come to this great land.The long overcoats , the leather jackets and high heels . we never get a chance to wear these in india as its never that cold.
guess what it was still winter when i reached ,so my old dream finally was achieved ! apart from that now when it’s summer , people have come out of their shells and overcoats have made way for colorful cheery orange and peach minis and shorts. am loving the season and this freedom to wear whatever you like.
Pets
As in india we can see every couple has one or two kids tagged to them , here you can find people parenting pets . am a dogs person and it’s an absolute delight to watch the varieties of breeds here.and the amazing thing is here in every 5 people one will surely have a pet specifically a dog. and they are not just pets but they are like their own kids. They take them everywhere they go,and there are even dog grooming centers , how amazing is that !! There are parks here which are specifically for dogs. now it’s not a rare thing for india but the number of these facilities here and the number of pets i see around me is really something new for me. a whole section in big shopping malls are dedicated to the needs of pets , starting from their food to their sleeping mats.and No stray dogs anywhere . i thought about my stray pet dog back in india which always used to sit below our house. and we used to feed it daily. 🙂 , now that is a rare thing you cannot find it here . :p
Shopping groceries
The number of options you can find here for a simple can of milk will make you cry and run for your mom!! in India i used to stay in a rented apartment and a milkman would deliver everyday a packet of milk at my doorstep if i have earlier informed him. it never crosses your mind even whether it’s a cow milk or buffalo milk !! its like it cannot be anything other than a cows milk!!. and here the first time i went for buying a can of milk, it was as if i was shopping for diamond where i need to know the cut , the carat and all the geeky stuffs!! i didn’t had any clue then what’s the difference between a red colored can , blue colored , white colored.or what it means to be 20 percent fat , or whole milk .?!
I was overwhelmed with the enormous options i could find regarding food items!! its not just milk here , its a fat or a non fat milk or a 20 percent fat milk!!!
Fitness
I still don’t understand how America stands number one as the most obese county in the whole world!! i mean at anytime of day i can see people here jogging, running , cycling!! i was so inspired that i too started running outside in the parks , before i used to run only in the gyms. i find people here are really passionate and motivated about fitness. Again it’s not very strange as compared to india , but imagine seeing someone running in the middle of lunch time , now thats a time we indians love to take a nap :p
Here i feel fitness is a daily routine it’s not a hobby!! in india if a girl of my stature(considering am average build) is going to gym , the nearby aunty will ask me ” dear , you are so thin , what’s the need of a gym!!??? “. it’s like we must hit the gym if we wanna loose weight not for any other reason. but yeah slowly that trend is changing with the new youth of country taking the fitness mantra seriously.
Finally
The verdict ..with my short experience of the country….
Every country , every city has its own charm , but they do have one thing in common . The people and their the passion to survive .and i am fortunate enough to have got this chance to experience this great land of america.
At the end of day , if i have one cup of indian special tea in my hand and td by my side , then every country , every place is beautiful for me.
namrataTanmay
yehzindegi 