It was in 1992 that I set out to earn my masters in Metallurgy. It was also then I discovered booze, casual sex and takeaway restaurant jobs.
My scholarly life had never bothered my parents.It was impressive and irrelevant-all at the same time. They let me live my own life, gave me choices and were understanding over my complicated decisions that other families would have deliberately branded paranoid. So when I called to make an announcement from my Jamshedpur campus over my admission in a foreign land, they were only too pleased to react. And thus, I was on a plane to an unknown land, spirited enough to experiment, free willed to make a living and fixated might over a two letter suffix.
PROLOGUE 1:
Cans of food lined the table.
Shiny dark hairs dangled glamorously to the loud music.My stomach twitched making me feel like an outcast in a crowd of blastema. I saw my gal pals ,with frosted eyelids and palled out lipsticks , exhausted but ready to twist their hips and groove in sync.
What was this life? I had thought.
I was the national topper in my high school level.All I knew was fun. The fun in endless hours of reference books and extra fun with calculus. I relocated to Jamshedpur for my under graduation. The template of endless reference hours continued except for my monthly movie outings and everyday snack of Aalu Parathas , roasted nuts at the near end of the campus road. But here I was, in a weekend sleepover party at one of my firang classmates’ place trying to figure out Johnnie Walker and what people meant when they mentioned cassoulets.
And they she came . Jessica ,with her liquid.
‘wanna this?’ she asked .
‘Why not?” I said and without any effort, I drank.
I felt strangely excited and convoluted.
Alcohol had arrived in my life.
Prologue 2:
By the time my coursework started inflating , I had got acclimatized with this new lifestyle, working in a Tandoori Restaurant late night and studying by the side. I made road trips on the weekends, discovering plentiful vegetation sipping my miller lite and taking pictures , which btw would have made dad proud. I thought of the endless walks I made with dad to the studios to get our developed prints. I thought of the day when dad finally discovered internet and how he chuckled . Sometimes, only sometimes, I missed them.
I mostly spent time clandestinely thinking about Paul.
Paul was the kind of boyfriend every girl liked to have. Cliche, but Paul was my sunshine at class. Infact, he was every girl’s sunshine. For his green eyes. For his intellect. For the way he smiled . For the way he sashayed down the corridor . And importantly, for the way he spread his charm.
One winter morning when I was out loose for sandwiches, I saw Paul in a shockingly close distance.
Paul and I got talking. What started with a breakfast brief extended to a luncheon. We missed our classes. Duh, It din’t matter. Not now.
That same evening I drove to my apartment, hyperventilating and shocked as hell.
“I like you”, he had said. I was floating.“So would he be“, I thought. I was always the narcissist.In nothing less than two days, I found myself guiding Paul’s hands down under. That night, we made love.
America had gotten inside me, I realised.
Prologue 3:
I was all set for graduation.
I looked at Jessica, in the southern end , posing gleefully for pictures that probably would be treasured long. I looked at Paul , who threw us a fit by getting married two months back to Sudha.
“He has a thing for Indian girls”, I heard Denizer blabber around.
I vivdly remembered how Paul broke my heart years back. I was messed up but had strength enough to walk along. I later switched boyfriends, got my heart broken a lot of times before I finally met Prakash in the wobbly room where a cult of Indians met up for dinner now and then.
I found my fingers entwined to his and it was only when they called out my name that I released myself from Prakash’s side. I heard the applause and the hoots. I felt nice.
The night of my graduation, I sat sipping the infamous Cappuchino. Prakash was there too, discussing soccer animatedly with a friend. I thought how America had inflicted new perspectives in me. What was criminal there, wasn’t bad here. I saw how land to land, ocean to ocean , perspectives diverged , living differed though essentials remained the same.
I suddenly put down my mug, clambered up the stairs to reach my phone. I dialed my land’s code while my heart was silent , sincere and devoid of perspiration. I heard a delightful feminine voice burst from the other end.
“Amma?” , I called.
I was home.And I knew why.
