Travelogue-2

It has been a long wait in the airport once I declined to brave the Manhattan chill. After the Jamaican girl left for her flight ( God is Great!! ) , I continued with my "shitty" wait (refer Part-1). I had a hearty breakfast comprising of breadstick, chicken noodle soup and an orangeade. 6 more hours. I took the Air-Train to roam through the airport from one end to the other a couple of times. Bored of that,I called up home in India and also a few friends. What now? I downloaded JJWS for my 14 hr long settling time over a few land and water bodies.

And then, started the fun.....

I fortuitously spotted the typical squatting Desi queue in front of the Air-India counter. I joined in. I was joined by 2 Indian families, presumably both settled for quite some time in the US. The male protagonist of one of these families hails from Ahmedabad and his counterpart in the other was half Goanese and half Mumbaikar. Their accents and attitudes, however spoke volumes to oppose their genealogical loyalties. The volumes , nonetheless underwent a contraction when a few typical Gujarati "Deddy, Boll, Holl" were blurted out (no offence intended ). Another family was a typical Punjabi family hailing from where Aditya Chopra ended DDLJ, that same "smell of the earth, that rustic appearance, that sarson da saag accent". Add a prototype Telugu amma, appa, anna to that with their phonetic convolution (again no offence intended, just my inability to appreciate Dravidian languages). I was surprised to find that almost 50% of the assembled crowd did not have the quintessential "Satyameva Jayate" on their passports, but had the US emblem (don't know what it is called).

NRIs....they are huge

I took a couple of snaps in the airport and lazed about with my laptop. Sitting in the boarding lounge , with the "Entera, Tere naal, bhalo achhi, majha naam, kemches" resounding everywhere my AI-102 flight seems to be an excellent precursor of the celebration that is to come: INDIA!! (to be continued)