Being a "foreigner" in a foreign land

          United States of America, the name so powerful has attracted the world towards it and I am no exception. It always kindled the urge to visit the country as a kid. The urge transformed into ambition and now I am in The United States of America. There are a tons of reason for people to get attracted to this nation, but it is the technological development that cast a spell on me. I wanted to feel the power of technological advances; the speed of 4G data, auto-pilot in Tesla, advanced space science, breakthrough in medicine, to name a few.  It has been 10 months since I moved to United States. I am writing this to commemorate my 10th month's anniversary.

          Entering to United States was like banging into a huge bump of changes. It started with the queue at the immigration, to which I wasn't used to. I meant I wasn't used to the queuing system ever, I prefer to keep reasons for myself *winks*. I got stamped at the immigration counter and proceeded to collect my baggage. Needless to say like every student coming from India to United States, both of my check-in bags weighed a slight more than the allowed 23kgs. I did not have strength to pick my heavy bags. In fact, I had to let one of my bags go for another whole round on the conveyor belt only because I was not able to pick my bulky bag. I could not inch with my bag to try and pick it since the baggage claim counter was fully packed with my co-passengers. Seeing me struggle to lift my bags in a fully packed crowd, an American offered to help me. He seemed like God to me after my 20 hours flight. I was seated next to the last, right window in the flight from Delhi to ORD, Chicago. Being a carefree person that I am, I decided not to hurry and let the people who were in hurry to go ahead and get off the plane, before me. My experience in the baggage counter made me apprehend the need of getting down the plane as soon as I can. I never made the mistake of waiting to get down at the end again.

          Bharath was there to pick me. Even though it was my first time, I felt as if I were home. I can't possibly explain how I felt in that gleeful moment. All along my journey I conjured how I might feel to enter Unite States, but it was seeing Bharath that was more exciting than being in my fantasy land. In order to protect myself from the first waves of cold weather, I got a winter jacket form Bangalore. Although it was not perfect, it really proved useful. Bharath got gloves and cap for me at the airport. The "felt-like" temperature was -35⁰C, and I had literally run to the car. If you believe that it is possible to imagine what even a 0⁰C is feels like, you are absolutely wrong. That experienced can neither be explained nor imagined.

          From the airport we directly went to my school to learn more about the new student orientation. That is the time where I actually got to see proper snow and experience the proper winter air. I wasn't aware of the fact that winters are monochromatic and that the summer is the season of colors. I love colors in everything. I crave everything around me to be beautifully laden with colors. So I found United States very different from what I imagined it to be. In fact I imagined the color code system in USA to be opposite than what is followed. I thought people color the white background of snow with crayon of colorful clothing. But in winter, the fashion is camouflaged with the nature.

          I started learning and understanding the American way of life from the very moment I entered United States. My husband made me understand the road and their naming system on the way home from airport. Out all the scientific and amazing systems that are designed and adopted in this country, my favorite one is the road system. One can find food joints and gas station almost at every highway exists. There are rest homes and lodging facilities too, which is more than a convenience. If you are traveling, you really have nothing to worry about even if you forget anything. Everything here is designed to make life as easier as it can get.

          People here have mechanism to make the execution of simplest of the things, simple. For example, in India we use knife to cut apples and eggs, but here we have apple cutter and a separate egg cutter. Of course their presence in my kitchen makes my life easier (to cut and mainly clean them) and it is not difficult to manage without them. I am still not able to really fathom the need of these separate cutters nor am I ready to say they are not needed. Being a lazy that I am, I appreciate the attempt made to reduce the human effort in cutting apples and eggs. There are many such kitchen gadgets; corn peeler, pineapple cutter, egg yolk separator etc. I am talking only about the kitchen, but there are mechanisms and gadgets to make everything easy.

Since I am talking about the changes, I thought it would be wise to make a list of those. I tried to list the major and minor changes that I noticed till date:

·         Strawberry jam comes with achene.

·         You can forget your phone but not your chap-stick when you want to go out in winter.

·         Walk and drive on the right side of the road.

·         You can actually walk in a huge city with a map that is printed on the paper, not GPS since the whole place labeled with road signs.

·         You need GPS while you drive a car because sometimes if you miss a turn, you will have to drive couple of extra miles to get back!

·         You can get your work done by just writing an e-mail. I got an on-campus job just by e-mail.

·         You can choose each and every fruit you want to buy without the shopkeeper's intervention, something only Indians understand.

·         There is nothing called "bargaining".

·         The way you put your key inside the keyhole is also upside down, compared to India of course.

·         You can drink water directly from the tap!

·         You hardly see buses or people crushing themselves into a car.

·         You can't print your photos if vary from the standard dimensions, which is annoying.

·         You allow pedestrians to cross the road if you are driving unlike in India where the pedestrians cross the road when there are less, or no vehicles.

·         You get hot water and cold water in every tap of the house.

·         You have to give the driver's test when the examiner as shotgun, unlike it happens back home in India.

·         People drink cold water even in winter.

·         You and your time have the highest priority in others books.

          We all change as we grow up. Fact is, "growing up" itself means to change. Our intellect, reasoning power, common sense and everything that you can list about yourself grow and change as time passes. The way we think, dress, eat, talk, walk, behave; the list goes on. Out of everything, change that I am really proud of is that I have been expanding my comfort zone considerably as I grow. By comfort zone I don’t mean the confidence by itself, but the pace in which I embrace the change around myself. "Change in lifestyle" wasn't something new to me. Of course I have changed 6 different abodes and cities in 10 years. But migrating to United States has been the greatest leap and I am happy for the way I have embraced the changes around me.

           Like every Indian who is new to United States, I converted the dollars into rupee before deciding if anything I liked is worth buying. This did not affect me because I had my lovely husband alongside in all my shopping trips. I entered the country wondering if I can establish myself here. But now after 10 months here, I have successfully built a routine life here with my husband. I give full credits to my husband and all the wonderful people I met here. Before coming here I thought it would be difficult to live amidst the Americans because I didn't know they are as good hearted as they are. They do have a major hand in making my stay pleasant with their warm welcome. They helped me in everything I wanted without hesitation in a way that I don't feel that I am a foreigner anymore.