The drive from the airport to the hotel on the Highway 101 was eerie in a sense. A combination of jet-lag and general exhaustion clouds your mind, to the extent that it wasn't clear as to which was actually "real". Is *this* the "real" home and .....all the images of India spread over 6 years was actually a big dream!? Can I go to our place opposite Encinal Park, knock at the door and find family welcoming me? It was all way too confusing!
Nothing had changed.... the general feel of the highway, the cars and the exits.... It all came back in a trice ....just as we pick up the thread after a good night's sleep. "Millbrae", "Rengstroff", "Embarcadero", "Mathilda"... names that had receded to the mind's background, were shuffled once more... they had suddenly become playing-cards that I must hold close to my chest.....at least for a month.
America doesn't change. Perhaps, it doesn't need to. India revels in change and thereby ensures that its residents don't suffer from Alzheimer's disease! These are two diametrically opposite ways of thinking- get it right the first time and the other extreme-ensure that you NEVER get it right so that there is always scope for "jugaad" and desi-innovation! Two-way roads become one-way, one-way becomes two-way, Bangalore becomes Bengaluru, the intersection now has an underpass in progress, the round-about has been razed down and a flyover in all its monstrosity now looms over it, a mall has a taken over the chawl...India is a painting which is forever "in progress". We hate to sign our names and complete the painting. Thereby, we all stay employed, alert and alive!
The Bay-Area is beautiful.... mountains on all sides, blues skies and bright sunshine.. the weather- just perfect. It is difficult to miss the expanse of space...like a film in "cinemascope"....everything appears magnified and expanded....and the previous sepia-tinted images that the mind has stored of these places, at times, just does not fit. The roads seem wider, the intersections bigger and the parking lots seem to stretch endlessly.
For an instant, it looks totally unnecessary and a complete waste- there is absolutely no reason to position the buildings so far away from the road. Surely we could have done better than this... built at least 4 full rows of houses and sold each of them as "Highway View Apartments!"
Nothing had changed.... the general feel of the highway, the cars and the exits.... It all came back in a trice ....just as we pick up the thread after a good night's sleep. "Millbrae", "Rengstroff", "Embarcadero", "Mathilda"... names that had receded to the mind's background, were shuffled once more... they had suddenly become playing-cards that I must hold close to my chest.....at least for a month.
America doesn't change. Perhaps, it doesn't need to. India revels in change and thereby ensures that its residents don't suffer from Alzheimer's disease! These are two diametrically opposite ways of thinking- get it right the first time and the other extreme-ensure that you NEVER get it right so that there is always scope for "jugaad" and desi-innovation! Two-way roads become one-way, one-way becomes two-way, Bangalore becomes Bengaluru, the intersection now has an underpass in progress, the round-about has been razed down and a flyover in all its monstrosity now looms over it, a mall has a taken over the chawl...India is a painting which is forever "in progress". We hate to sign our names and complete the painting. Thereby, we all stay employed, alert and alive!
The Bay-Area is beautiful.... mountains on all sides, blues skies and bright sunshine.. the weather- just perfect. It is difficult to miss the expanse of space...like a film in "cinemascope"....everything appears magnified and expanded....and the previous sepia-tinted images that the mind has stored of these places, at times, just does not fit. The roads seem wider, the intersections bigger and the parking lots seem to stretch endlessly.
For an instant, it looks totally unnecessary and a complete waste- there is absolutely no reason to position the buildings so far away from the road. Surely we could have done better than this... built at least 4 full rows of houses and sold each of them as "Highway View Apartments!"
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