The disgruntled onlooker's insight into the life(or whatever) in the USA

Part I: A different dawn

17^th August, 2007. The day before, i.e 16^th, was an important day. Very important. Not only because it was my mother’s birthday but for some other reasons too. The night of the 16^th was stormy. But not a storm that everyone could see or feel. It even rained. But again, not the sort of rain everyone would be drenched in. As the storm and the rain subsided slowly in blissful sleep, it started to rain even harder. Only this time, the whole city was wet. The rain continued as I reached the airport around 5 in the morning( As someone later pointed out, I could have written that the city wept because I was leaving. But that is too melodramatic, too much me. So I deliberately decided not to write it). When I checked in, the sun was slowly coming out of the clouds. Then, a long and tiresome and uneventful journey punctuated by red wines and vodkas and whiskeys on the rocks. And about 30 hours later I was standing on a wooden verandah in a house in New Jersey. Watching the sky reddening. Watching the sun coming out once again. Only this time, an American sun on an unknown sky marking a different dawn. And for the first time in those 30 hrs the feeling sank in. I knew I was away from home. I knew I was not going back soon. And it rained once again. Inside.

P.S: This has been long due. Perhaps too long. Especially for someone like me who cribbed a lot about the usual leaving-ones-city-and-roots-and-going-abroad stuff. That too, publicly. May be even to some people’s dismay. But settling down in a new place, getting your internet connection up and working, cooking and above all, getting into a mood for writing, surely takes up a hell lot of a time. That is more or less what delayed this.