I have been working long and hard .. not to say productive but i know its beyond me when i fail to distinguish the sunrise and sunset that capture the day and look at the color change in the sky and start my count down again..
A starbucks cofee long gone cold, a piece of an old apple pie , memories of sambar idly , a smelly tiffin box, 3 hand kerchiefs of different colors, a comb, a sock and a cartload of papers , each of them having been scribbled over enough number of times and their ink smudged and paper dog eared , a watch , earphones of my IPOD(without my ipod), an empty purse and a dishevelled look on my face and a pang on excitement when i think of bed and stuffed toys ..
when i reach that point of state mentioned above , where the physical self disowns the senses , i know that i have worked long enough..
when my head bobbles up and down the ocean of panic, i should lest realize that i should go home..
Well....... else if i am still not done with the work, my brain takes occassional breaks ,bows down to the caffine and lets my hand take over to write the most distressed and boring blog ever like this one...

Realization of your ignorance strikes you high and hard when it comes to making decisions ... true... but in a new country and new culture..you are reminded of it constantly by being judged by your own mind , unconcious reference to self as a quintessential douche is indeed inevitable.....

On one such days , when the essence of being the newbie strings on to me ,the inherent work ass does justice to its term and i decide to spend the night in the lab working on "Stuff", with a friendly dude who apparently stays back to watch movies.

Dude: Lets go for a cofee !!
Me : Sure !! I am dying to get one .. (my perspicacity failing to realize this was the first time i went out for cofee )

We take a leisurely stroll and talk about all the things under the sun , from coursework to religion and reach the prototypal all night cofee shop.

There i find a haven of similar shaped cofee mugs with freshly brewed content.. all same color with different names none of which i can identify .

'Columbian roast', 'French vanilla' , etc etc etc. well those were the two which i could atleast read.
choices : Black : all above mentioned..
Creamer/Milk : An equal number of options much to my confusion.
sugar : different color packets categorized on weight,content of sucrose and a zillion other things..
While my dude just knows the 'right choice'... i grapple around with my eyes , hoping they do not accidentally mislead my ignorance.. Not that i am ashamed (but what the heck!! everyone wants to be omniscient)..

Dude , realises it.. (afterall he has been a newbie too ) and much to my irritation, with a puffed up chest, calls up his choice , which is a complicated jargon of words , from which my mind could only cut out words belonging to the layman family like 'black', 'hot','tall'.. rest all went unheard..

Now my turn to order...
I just wanted to order a filter cofee and think of its wafting smell and the hard struck taste that gives you a high even before the caffine reaches your blood.

More than excited , i reached out, grabbed my senses , pondered for a while and said 'Ditto' ..and proudly smiled to self , while my brain neurons do a wild tango and hug each other .. for having found a roundabout to save embarrasment..

Now.. how did i get over it..

Empowered by 'Google'. :)

When you have lived through time when you had everything one could ever want but never realised how important they were , when you have had a home town to go to at the distance of a bus ride, friends all around you, food you take for granted to be available at the nearest local restaurant , the public transport at your disposal, phone you could use without worrying whether you could manage the bills,a cofee shop to spend those unforgettable precious moments with a dear one, a job that you could get killed working, more friends who would listen to your yapping ,a monthly salary and a single independent life and when you embark on a dream that you have long planned.. , you assume you are mentally prepared to give up everything for a short stint so that u can make it big in life...but no matter how prepared or planned in advance, it always comes in as a shock.. atleast to people who are not ashamed to be in touch with their emotions. Is it worth while ?? Do these fleeting thoughts make you a different person or do they just bring out an inherent form of expression that never had the opportunity to rise up and high ? Should you learn to grow up by trying to remain untied from these thoughts which choke you up, by being objective or should you let it overwhelm you once in a while ? I hope the destination is worth the journey!!!

Many a times we end up doing stuff , ignorant of the ramifications of our actions..
One tiny example of that is celebrating holi..
For a southie like me , who most always ran away from colors of holi ,be it in the neighbourhood or college , verbally slaughtered by my north indian friends as 'murdering the spirit of holi' ,any opportunity to look at an ocean of brown faces in a foreign counrty is more than enticing..
and so i went 2 be a part of the gang which managed to find an "indi dukan" in the middle of nowhere and armed with colors that would put a rainbow to shame , we launched the celebration.
Nothing gives you more a pleasure to destroy the tidy corridors and muddle the pool into a heavenly mixture .. well. nothing , probably more than trying out wild designs on people you dont even know , venting your vendatta on "any" available clean face :).
Grab the opportunity .!! well.. all done ....... serenity demolished , assignments ,exams and due papers long forgotten , out come brown people in all sizes and shapes with a dab of blue,green and what not. Some one even went to the extent of getting out chilli powder!!
dude!! hold on!! hell no .. i like holi but i dont wanna be crippled for life.......
and so it went............ for an hour,two , prob 5..
When the noise became too much,and people looked at us appalled ,prob wondering whether the natives have decided to launch their attack ...... and someone s meek warning that cops mite sniff us out.. thats when the fun stopped... well. temporarily atleast..
Do we need a reason to celebrate .. !!
mera desh mahan :)

Sometimes , at unexpected places and times, my brain goes into the state of fuzzyness.
..a meta state where your brain,mouth and other visible reflexes fail to co-ordinate , where they all shamelessly fail each other and plunge into a confused blackhole..
Moral of the observed behaviour : I need sleep..

Of late,it has been happening at quite a few other instances.. an interiew at that!
Confidently entering, i vigourously shake hand,much to the "wise guy"s mistaken assumption that i was going to devour the job.

He glances at my resume (which unfortunately mentions more stuff under my skill set than i know -- the contrived work of an alter self, a greedy one typical of students hunting desperately for positions to pay for tution)
and casually throws a neutron bomb by starting with a complex code in the language i am unaware of.

Poor me , already gasping for air and silently cursing my bad luck and wondering where on earth were all my lucky stars and mom s prayers when i badly needed them,started off with a smart alecky verbose detour of the problem .
But the guy wanted none of those..

Having successfully aced some university exams just by prolific writing devoid of contents,i thought the experience would be a nitrobooster to my answering skills, but the lucky threads in my sun signs were probably eclipsed at the unexpected moment.

My interiew proceeds ,and a coupla minutes in, my status elevates to being "royally screwed" .I want to give up everything,tear my hair off and run out of the room yelling at the top of my voice .." I dont want the job" . But i have no choice.
Endless questions being shot at me,with occasional smirks and grins and quips of caustic humour leaves me dizzy and the afore mentioned state.. my mouth fails to listen to my brain ,as the former has reached a reject state due to dearth and mix of up contents of t he latter..

Result : Need i mention ?

Mom!!
Bunch of different things thrown into a single body..
Unofficial google search of our house..She can find anything from a lost sock to air tickets missing at the crucial time.. Her efficiency gets a nitroboost if she smells that air of importance that says everyone else is depending on her..and 99% of the time she finds what she is looking for.
That must be the better than the best search algorithms ever implemented in this world and also with a daughter like me blessed with goldfish memory,it does come in handy.
:)

Happy Republic Day..!!!Never felt this patriotic even back in India..

Going home? .........
The most dreaded question ever encountered by an indian newbie at US schools..
wherein home is referred to,unconsiously , as a place where people go when they have no jobs.. and lol!! i am currently one of the pathetic lot ,who does not have a part time job to run across ,right after class,pretending to not even have time to pull over your half drawn sweater over your shoulders or stop to say a friendly "hi".

Typical sequence of conversation...

The first day you land..
..er.. Hope u had a good journey.. Were all your suitcases intact..Good Day......

First week..
..hmm.. Are you all settled now? Did u find a room mate yet?.. don worry u l just have to wait till classes start.. u'l find a job soon..

Second week.. 4 days after classes start..
..How are the classes going on?Did you email people asking for part time?

Third week..
Me.. : I have been spamming everyone royally.........
Folks(with jobs who had been through the cycle): Well.. make sure u don send our the same thing..Tailor your email and spam them..;)same technique..

Middle of Third week..(9 days after classes)..
Folks..: Did you find a job..
Me: not yet.. am still looking(LOOKING!!!!! thats a white lie!! a variant version of euphemism.. I have been screwing everyone s mail box ,regardless of their department or connection to what i am..ppl have been scared to check their e-mails for the fear of seeing my seemingly persuasive mail).
Folks..: Its ok.. keep going.. Times will get better..(more fundas like..)..Some one is always looking to hire.. you just need to find who..(snippets and phrases ideal to fit in a "life l get better" documentary)

End of third week..(13 days after classes start)..
I happened to leave class with one of the folks who had a job..and midway down the road..
She: Are you going home?? (with a "poor u" look and voice so full of pity that if i were blessed with one like that,i could have persuaded the dean to give up his job for me)
Me:Yeah.. well.. not exactly.. well going places.. and with my brain trying to pull out random department names from its folds,my mouth rattles out a filtered refined few and combines them into a sentence like this..
Actually,I am going to the medical center for an interview .and then have a meeting with a professor(non existent)..
She:Good luck....
Me: Thanks a ton..(half smiling)..

Whew!! what a relief...
then i run back home, take liberty of using my roomie's laptop and build a new list(probably 7th ) of people who could hire me....

and so on it goes.........................hoping someday in the near future, i will join the band of people who can rush to part time jobs and express pity to a new batch of newbies............