Air-borne
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Finally, the day broke its dawn where-in I had to travel back to Bangalore – to get into the daily scuffle of work, the music in chaos of day to day life, the thrums of millions en route, the charismatic opulence of riches and rags. Oops, am I having a critique panorama of my motherland? Better to cease the uncanny thoughts. The last week in Minneapolis was hectic, with lots of over-the-coffee discussions with team members I closely worked with during the course of my stay that spanned a grandiose four winter months.
Having got a drop at the airport by a great friend, I was eager to finish the formalities of check-in and stove my luggage, two large suitcases, aptly multicolored, that have already been eyed upon by passersby with that ‘Indians-carry-a-lot’ look. There was some issue at the check-in process, though made light by a smile of the ticketing agent as technical glitch – my data was not pulled up correctly at the reservation system. My java enabled brain was let loose to do a root cause of the problem to find potential solutions or at least a troubleshoot scenario! Would it be a Database issue? Would it have some hassles at the User Interface end? - Strange thoughts swimming at unnecessary times. The savior arrived decked up in a black tuxedo and armed with a peppermint smile delving into the subject right away indicating the fastidious skills of airlines crew. An alternate option was proposed and agreed upon by the ticketing agent giving a green signal for me to embark on my return journey.
Tortured by hunger as the time signaled lunch, I and a colleague tried to gobble down some Mexican food, the blandness of it alleviated by making it closer to Indian by ceremoniously spraying many packets of salt and pepper. We parted ways as his flight was in another direction with a promise to meet at Paris since the itinerary joined us there. I would have literally mumbled a song from Bollywood flicks themed on friendship and whatnot!
The first leg from Minneapolis to Detroit would have been uneventful if not for miss M, a college grad who shared the seat next to mine with an iPod and a sweatshirt that flared an American University logo. Conversation undulated easily rather than perfunctory greetings that people succumb to in front of total strangers. The second trip flew faster as I recollect less since I got a pretty good sleep broken at times by the zest of air crew to stuff me with their delicacies. We seem to be the chosen one as they gave the first set of meals to a selected few – not a preference or privilege as it turned out that we gave special orders for Asian food.
A bit of planning ensured that my friend was seated close in the flight to Bangalore with an aim to talk to reduce the pain in travelling approximately eight hours. Sadly, not even the first sentence did get a response as when the cabin crew announced take- off, the dearest friend was completing initial rituals of a lengthy slumber and I, for fear of an angry look, left her dreaming in that vivid world. After few hours of trashing in my music player, I got something vaguely termed as a sleep, only to be woken up by countless lights announcing the arrival.
The journey can be termed as complete only when I walked out and boarded a taxi back to my apartment with voices ringing of my friend who got her baggage delayed and news about the other colleague who missed the whole second part from Paris.
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