FlightPain

1:25pm - Austin Time
2:25pm – Detroit Time
12:25pm – Denver Time

Flying is weird. I still think humans weren’t really ever meant to fly. I’d like to quote Douglas Adams here: “The knack to flying lies in throwing yourself at the ground and missing”. Planes are just about as reliable as that.

Yesterday, I was supposed to fly out from Austin to Detroit. I wanted to start at 2.00pm, and I did. But of course, everything went wrong. There was an accident on I-35 that slowed down traffic terribly; the check-in lines were super long; I was fined for my luggage being overweight; and I was “randomly selected” for extra special screening.

I like how things in the US are disguised so expertly...absolutely nasty meat is covered in all sorts of sauces, salad is rabbit food without the dressing, you see signs such as ‘Want to have an exciting career as a State Trooper? Apply here!’ everywhere, all the time. The attendant behind the desk looked at me, smiled, and said ‘You’ve been selected for extra screening!’ as he handed me my boarding pass. He might have been saying ‘You’ve been selected as the winner of our $40000000000 award!’

It was already 10 minutes past my boarding time, but I went through the rigorous screening process. They scanned my luggage, and asked me to go and stand between glass partitions (which were possibly bullet-proof). Finally, a security-officer approached me and went into a diatribe of airline safety policies, and telling me exactly what she was about to do. She struck me as a Don’t-mess-with-me-‘coz-I’m-so-professional kind of person, although the way she delivered her speech reminded me forcefully of Shakespeare. ‘Are there any sensitive or injured parts of your body that I need to made aware of?’ she said at last.

I looked at her and shrugged. ‘I’m ticklish’.

I’m sure she was laughing when she patted me down.

The rest of the procedure was uninteresting. I sat in a relatively comfortable seat, looking bored, while they went through my bags. I was annoyed; they were, after all, unpacking my carefully over-stuffed bags, bags that I had to almost sit on so that I could zip them. Afterwards, when they were done, they cunningly left certain items outside my bags, so that I could wrestle with the closing ceremony again. Bah.

When I got to my gate, the flight had been cancelled.

I got another ticket for today, which I didn’t mind. I got my fine-money back; I discovered that I could take a full-extra suitcase with me; I cooked something real for myself for the first time in my life; and I watched ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ again.

My friend Ammar, the biggest airplane-buff to be found in a radius of 7 miles, asked me if I needed a ride to the airport, because he loves driving, loves watching cars at the airport, loves the airport, and loves watching planes flying over the highways that lead to the airport. I figured he preferred doing a good deed over studying hopelessly for a pending exam. I also figured I’d be doing him a favor if I asked him for a ride.

Today, I was ‘randomly selected’ for a special screening again. This time, I was ready. While they went through my bags, I read. It would have been extra-fun if I had been reading ‘The Inscrutable Americans’.

On my flight, a little 2-year-old kid sitting in the seat behind me screamed and kicked at my seat the whole way. I got back at him by falling asleep. While de-boarding, a passenger pointedly remarked (so that everybody on the plane heard him), ‘what a well-behaved kid!’

I got a really cool picture of clouds on my flight from Denver to Detroit (Shown above). It was the sort of picture that reminded me of the very first sentence that introduced me to similes and metaphors…"the clouds were marshmallows in the sky".

More of this and that

So Negin and I went on another ridiculously long walk yesterday. Our destination: the bats on Congress Bridge.

We waited for them. And then they appeared. We had to move down towards the Barton Springs side of the bridge to see them clearly. As we looked down at them, we remained silent.

Finally, I spoke.
'That's it?'
We saw a swarm of oversized brown fluttery things, flying under the bridge in vicious circles, swirling and swimming in the air. The sight was mesmerizing, but not what I'd expected.
'What did you expect?' I asked Negin.
'I thought I'd see a swarm of 1.5 million bats leaving the bridge and rising up into the sky,' Negin said. Beside us, we heard a five-year-old say the exact thing to his father.

Oh well. At least we saw the bats.

Afterwards, our hunger led us to Wendy's. As the cashier returned my change, I looked at the quarter I got back, and commented on how I always tried to collect the 50 quarters for each of the different states, but failed because I ended up using the quarters for laundry.
Behind us, a guy started laughing.
'I'm sorry,' he said, turning red, as we looked at him. 'I didn't mean to overhear you, but I know what that's like.'

This morning, Negin freaked out when she found out her father's old high-school friend had decided to visit her. The apartment was a mess. We started cleaning up frantically, and shared stories about how we'd made people wait outside before while we threw everything into the closet or under the bed. 2 hours later, the apartment was barely presentable. 4 hours later, she called me, whining about how here dad's friend had called her, met her outside the apartment gates, and left, saying he was too busy to come inside.
It reminded me of dressing up for a party, and not going anywhere. Tragic.

Later, I had another long 58 minute long counseling session with my parents, who were ready to make the house look like the Jerry Springer show. It was almost fun, because I got to end the conversation with an admonishment of 'behave yourselves!'. :)

My latest favorite hangout is the Epoch, a weird 24 hour place with good coffee and mostly-good music. And a crazy waitress who is constantly swearing at her co-worker.

I've been taking drivers license practice tests all evening. People tell me that I'm worrying more than I should be: the test is mostly common sense. But as they say, common sense is uncommon in common people. I'm very common.
They also say the test is easy. But they also said ME 210 was easy. Screw them.

I need to go back and write my promised ode to YouTube. I found this old song I'd danced to when I was in 6th grade, at this annual school show where I also acted in a sixth-grade version of Shakespeare's 'Macbeth'.

I was proud of that play, because I was the director, script-writer, and protagonist. My classmates and I did a hell of a good job practicing our lines and getting the costumes ready. On the final day, however, I realized that there were certain details we had forgotten to iron out. The disposal of 'dead bodies' for instance.

As the girls died one by one, they just got up and ran off the stage, to the amusement of the audience. I was annoyed; it was my show, and they were ruining it. However, when I finally died in the final scene (I was Macbeth), I waited for somebody to drag me off the stage. As it turned out, all the other actors had somehow ended up on the right side of the stage, whereas I was on the left side. (There was no backstage). Only one girl remained on the left side. She was also one of the smallest cast-members. She tried her best to drag me out of sight, but she was at least 20 lbs lighter than I was, and in the end, I just got up and ran off the stage.
The school called Macbeth a 'comedy of errors' for a long time after that.

I related the story to Negin, and she said she remembered acting in one play in elementary school. She was a tree.

Escape

My aunt died 3 days ago.

She was in her forties, and left behind a husband, 4 kids, and a new daughter-in-law. Her death was a shock to everyone - even though she weighed about 200 lbs more than was good for her, and had been confined to her bed for over 4 years.

Even though I rarely saw her, she'd been a big part of my childhood - she was generous, liked by everybody, and put everybody else's comfort before her own. She was a wonderful parent - and made sure her kids grew up to be respectful and hardworking.

It's strange that I haven't mourned her death as much as I would have expected myself to. I suppose physical distance does that to you.

I wonder if dealing with death becomes easier as you grow older. Or if age just makes things worse. I feel desensitized right now, but I know things would have been different if I had been in the same house as the rest of her family members, wading through a flood of memories.

When I was 10, my grandmother passed away. I had been inconsolable. My cousin and I used to fight over whose house our grandmother would live in, and I still have fond memories of her, despite a very vivid memory of her calling me 'bedhab' - which meant 'disobedient brat'.

It's hard to imagine how things change while we're away; it seems that we expect people and places to remain the same, even though we ourselves change. Nothing seems real to me right now: I can only try to remember the times that I spent with my aunt, little things that I wish I had listened more closely to, the wasted moments when I chose to go out and do insignificant things when I could have pleased her by spending a little more time with her. When I picture my next visit home, I reach a dead-end ... a place of such infinite sadness that I don't want to go there. I make a U-turn and go back to laughing with my friends, or reading a book.

The book I was reading recently, 'Waiting for Daisy', explained the Japanese notion of wabi-sabi: life, like the cherry blossom, is beautiful because of its impermanence, not in spite of it, more exquisite for the inevitability of loss.

It makes sense...but wisdom about the inevitability of life and death does not help.
At all.

A Foray into the World of Arranged Marriages

Sadly, my mom has, once again, started broaching the subject of marriage.

"So - have you found anyone yet?" she asked yesterday.
"I'm not looking. So what did you cook today?" I said.

I think Indian parents start thinking about their kids' weddings the day they (the kids) are born - nay, conceived. 'Bride and Prejudice', though overly exaggerated, with a terrible soundtrack, still has an element of truth in it. The presence of well-wishing relatives doesn't help. As soon as they see two single youngsters, apparently eligible, the benevolent, bored, dormant match-maker in them surfaces.

Almost the youngest in the family, I know it's not my turn yet, and won't be for another five years- but my mother likes taking revenge for the Hellish times I made her go through while I was a teenager.

"You know, you should talk to that boy I was telling you about - he's so nice and respectful. I can give you his contact information."

"If you do that, I swear I'll send him a rakhi."

Raksha Bandhan is a Hindu festival which uses a rakhi, a fancy thread that is a symbol of the bond between a brother and a sister. Traditionally, a sister ties the thread on her brother's wrist every year, indirectly asking for protection. . . And money.

In India, cousins are considered to be like brothers and sisters. Since I don't have any real brothers, I landed in my cousins' houses every year. They never stopped complaining about this festival, and how unfair it is to the male pocket. Tradition, however, is tradition.

The rakhi is also a seldom-talked-about secret weapon that the Indian woman weilds. By tying the rakhi around a male friend's wrist, the girl is implying that she thinks of the friend as a brother. The dreams of several people I know have thus been ruined by a piece of thread.

"A rakhi doesn't mean anything," my mom replied loftily. Oh yes it does. "Besides, that would be a very stupid thing to do."

"If you like him so much," I seethed, "YOU marry him."

My dad, who was listening in, started laughing. My mom, even though I couldn't see her (over 9000 miles of wireless connection), probably gave him one of her you-aren't-exactly-helping-here stares. She dropped the subject of that particular boy, hiding her panic well. She probably figured that a rakhi would be a suicidal move.

"What about the boys in your college?" she persisted.
"They're all Gujratis," I said, inventing wildly. Gujratis are people from the state of Gujrat - they're cool, and awesome, and have nothing wrong with them, but a senseless excuse is still an excuse. My sister, two years older than me, claims all the guys in her school are Biharis (from the state of Bihar). Which is almost the Indian-equivalent of saying that all guys are red-necks. I know that's her defending herself from all potential matches.

My mother sighed, and gave up. She'll be back in action soon.
I know she means well. But the whole situation is, quite frankly, rather laughable.

A Batty Adventure

Fact: If you live in a particular city, there is a 95% probability that you've not been to its tourist attractions. (The 5% is to account for all the enthusiastic fanatics out there). And yes, there probably is uncertainty also.

Source: Me

I would've called it Nimisha's Theory # who know's what, but the truth is that the above really is a fact, not a theory.

Yesterday, my friend Negin and I decided to go for a walk after dinner to digest the excellent thai food we'd had (she, apparently, didn't agree with the excellence of the food). In any case, we started walking, walked around the Capitol, and somehow ended up at the Congress Bridge again. The railing on the left side couldn't be seen because of all the people waiting to see the bats come out from under the bridge.

Every spring, about 1.5 million bats (the Mexican Free-Tails) migrate from Mexico and settle down in the crevices under the Congress Bridge. They go out to hunt every night, and are seen all summer, well into August. One of my friends, who was a guide on one of the tour-boats on Town Lake last summer, told me that the bat babies (called pups) are born during the summer. It's kinda funny how Mexican bats like their young to be American citizens. Heh.

The former public-nightmare was soon turned into a tourist-attraction...bats supposedly eat tonnes (thousands or millions of them) of insects every night. Every evening, around sunset, the bats come out in hoards, which is (supposedly) quite a sight.

I know all about it, but have never seen it happen. Yesterday seemed to be the day I would get that chance.

Negin and I found a spot at the railing, and waited. We waited for 45 minutes. We talked about things ranging from dog-vision to the phase diagram of water. But the bats didn't come out.

While standing there, resting against the railing, my hands felt strangely empty.

"We need to use some bait to get the bats to come out," I finally said.
"How?" Negin said.
"By using a fishing rod. And attaching a dead insect at its end. We could probably call that 'batting'. "
Negin and I looked at each other. And then we started laughing, and couldn't stop for a long time.

We left. And of course, true to Murphy's word, the bats came out soon after. We heard them while crossing 7th street. I guess the batting will have to wait till next time.

May 13-June 8 : A summary

I am still amazed at how quickly things (and people) change. My situation has changed drastically since last month. In between that last post and now, I pulled off the following stunts:

I stayed up for 84 hours (with a total of 3 hours in nap-time) between May 13th and May 16th, went to Houston (after 2.5 years), visited two of my friends there, went to Burnet for Leadershape, made 38 new friends in a week, did 350 crunches with Chioma, discovered my purpose in life, and how terribly awful the real world is.

I also walked from Far West back to UT campus (I was walking for 3.5 hours - that's about 12 miles), and made my friend/ex-roommate walk with me. I had several other walking adventures - down to 4th street and back, to Town Lake and back, to this random park on Lamar and back...

I talked myself into pretending that I would get my drivers license in 2 weeks - it's the 3rd week now, and I'm still on the 4th page of the Texas Drivers' Manual Study Guide.

I went to the Six-Flags Amusement Park in San Antonio with some friends - and rode real roller coasters after 9 long years (not counting one measely ride over spring break). The last time I had been on a roller coaster had been in April, 1998 - on the Space Mountain Ride at Disneyworld.

I also attended a class. That I wasn't registered for. Just for fun. And because I didn't know what to do with myself that particular day. And I took notes. I would say that I paid attention to 97% of what the professor said - which is some sort of a record. My belief in Tom Sawyer's (Mark Twain's, for that matter) theory about work and play is reinforced. It stated: "Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do."
I didn't go back because of other chores I had - apartment hunting etc., and now catching up with everything would qualify as work, so I think I'll let the class go.

I went to the Coop, and had a terrible time deciding what to spend my rebate money on - An awesome Magnetic Dartboard, or a book called 'An Illustrated Guide to Aerodynamics' - a book recommended by Dr.Hans Mark (the legendary professor of the Aerospace Department at UT) during my Freshman year. My friends Mana and Ankita continued to give me harassed looks throughout my decision-making process, and I had almost made up my mind to pay from my own pocket in order to get both things - when we ran into an old friend who had dropped out of Aerospace Engineering the previous year. She said she would just give the book to me.

I discovered how bad I was at Dart-throwing that night.

I played Badminton after months and months - and have been playing almost daily. I broke my watch while playing racquetball with a squash ball in a small court with 3 other people. I also picked up 3 books, and am reading all 3 of them - 'The Golden Gate' by Vikram Seth (A novel in verse), 'Angels and Demons' by Dan Brown, 'Waiting for Daisy' by Peggy Orenstein.

I'm now waiting for a letter, and a phone-call. And then, I might go home.

:)