The mother of all road trips : Day TWO

Day two started with leaving Louisville Kentucky and our aim was to drive 10 to 12 hours and get as further across Kansas as we possibly could.

We drove a couple of hours and stopped for breakfast at a Denny's. I was the only person of color there inside the Denny's. I am usually immune to racial differences around me but right then I realized that I was the only person of color I had seen for quite sometime. Although our server was super sweet to us, I was suddenly feeling uncomfortable. I was acutely aware of everyone just staring at me. I did feel like the alien the government insisted on calling me. I will not lie I was taking comfort that STP was white and with me. We finished our terrible breakfast and got out of there.

Soon we were out of Kentucky and going across the first major city St Louis, Missouri and crossing the mighty Mississippi.

Soon after crossing St Louis city parameters the scenery changed. It was so flat. Flat green grass, yellow corn fields and vast blue sky. This scenary was going to be with us almost till Denver. And no frequent restrooms, almost no cars on the road. For the first time I encountered not only a maximum speed but also a minimum speed limit on the highway and the minimum speed limit was 65. The maximum 80 and the slowest cars were driving at 90. It was a dream to drive down straight roads at 90 miles per hour with the cruise control on.

We decided to stop for lunch at Kansas City and get some of their famous bar-b-Que at Arthur Bryant's. There was a long line and the food was to put it nicely underwhelming. Also they fry their potatoes in peanut oil. Enough said.

Kansas City by the way is in Missouri and is not a city in Kansas. The city stretches forever. I tried to take a picture of the city from the car.
 

 

 

After Kansas City it was again the flat plains of mid-west USA. And then suddenly we found ourselves sorrounded by wind mills. It was almost surreal. These giant structures rising from the ground and stretched till as far as your eyes can see. They stretched for miles.

We were making good time and dare I say good mileage thanks to the straight flat roads. but suddenly without warning we got caught in a flash flood. It felt like driving through a waterfall. I was ready to park the car and wait but there were other cars which were also driving and emergency vehicles lining the road. It took up much of our time and having to fight the flash flood we decided to stop. But when you are in Kansas, it is literally the middle of nowhere. It is not possible to just stop. We had to drive for two more hours to find a place to stop and we stopped at Colby, Kansas. To give you an idea of what Colby Kansas is, here is a picture of the neighbourhood of our hotel. Just check the CINEMA house out.

Disclaimer : Apart from the Arthur Bryant poster all pictures have been taken from the car. Including the neighborhood picture.

The mother of all road trips : First Day

The first day was a long day of being on the road. We crossed the borders of Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky. We spent the night at Louisville Kentucky and paid a customary visit to the YUM Centre.

Most of the pictures that I am posting are unedited pictures taken from the car. I assume that since this is a road trip post series all pictures that shall be posted will be those from the car.

he day was uneventful. We moved across mostly rolling green fields with occasional farm lands. There were regular rest stops as we were driving mostly on the highways. Very similar to the road trips to Niagara or Illinois which I had done previously too. But the open blue sky and the clouds promised much more to come.

 

The mother of all road trips : Prelude

I have always been that person who travels or likes to travel. But all my travels have always followed a schedule. A schedule to go back to school, or go back to work. It always had a destination. Never had a journey. And I always dreamed of a trip like that. A trip where there are no destinations, no time limits, just sit in a car and drive, wherever you want to go.


Last to last week  on the 7th of June something rather unfortunate happened with work. Something that made my future in this country uncertain. It was uncertain to the point that I did not know if I had to leave by the end of the month. Although the prospect of going back home was appealing but I was hurt, disappointed, enraged about how things were being conducted, about how everything was unfair to say the least, how even when everyone at work openly acknowledged to what was happening to me was unfair still was not fighting the cause and reason for it, instead supporting it indirectly. Anyways I digress. What ended up happening was that I realized I had three weeks left in the country and for the first time ever I had no commitment. I had no deadlines, no project goals.I made a plan. I shared my plan with STP and he was onboard as soon as he heard it.

So I cleaned the apartment. Packed everything that could possible fit in my car, moved the bed, the dining table, the coffee table to STP's parents garage, donated the rest which took about 5 days and then the next morning got in the car, bought my last cup of wawa iced macchiato and was on my way.

 Destination : UNKNOWN.

"There was nowhere to go but everywhere,
  So just keep on rolling under the stars"
                                        -----Jack Kerouac

Philadelphia : Visson and Misson

Ofcourse the Vission and Misson are mine. And when it is my vision and mission it has to do with food. PhiilyMag has just come out with the top 50 restaurants of 2016 in Philadelphia. It does not have any of my favourites likes Stargazy, Stock, Era or  Kilimandjaro. And I have not been to any of these restaurants. So as part of my vision and misson in this year and my eternal quest to explore a city better I will embark on a journey of eating in as many of these places as I can . Anyways here is the list.



50 Best Restaurants in Philadelphia

•     Laurel, East Passyunk
•     Vernick Food & Drink, Rittenhouse
•     Fork, Old City
•     Vedge, Midtown Village
•     Townsend, East Passyunk
•     Vetri, Midtown Village
•     Sbraga, Center City
•     Bing Bing Dim Sum*, East Passyunk
•     Serpico, Bella Vista
•     Helm*, Kensington
•     Zahav, Society Hill
•     V Street*, Rittenhouse
•     Volver, Center City
•     Marigold Kitchen, University City
•     Cheu Noodle Bar, Washington Square West
•     Pumpkin, Grad Hospital
•     Will
•     East Passyunk
•     Bibou
•     Bella Vista
•     Fond
•     East Passyunk
•     Bud & Marilyn’s*
•     Midtown Village
•     Amis
•     Midtown Village
•     Zeppoli
•     Collingswood
•     Fitler Dining Room
•     Fitler Square
•     High Street on Market
•     Old City
•     Le Virtu
•     East Passyunk
•     Le Chéri
•     Rittenhouse
•     Russet
•     Center City
•     The Fat Ham
•     University City
•     Osteria
•     Spring Garden
•     Abe Fisher
•     Rittenhouse
•     Brigantessa*
•     East Passyunk
•     Heritage*
•     Northern Liberties
•     The Good King Tavern*
•     Bella Vista
•     The Farm and Fisherman
•     Washington Square West
•     Amada
•     Old City
•     Talula’s Garden
•     Washington Square West
•     Barbuzzo
•     Midtown Village
•     Talula’s Daily
•     Washington Square West
•     Kensington Quarters*
•     Fishtown
•     South*
•     Spring Garden
•     Jamonera
•     Midtown Village
•     Pub and Kitchen
•     Grad Hospital
•     Il Pittore (closed January 2016)
•     Rittenhouse
•     Aldine*,Center City
•     Bistrot La Minette*,Queen Village
•     Brauhaus Schmitz, Bella Vista
•     Opa*, Midtown Village
•     Little Fish, Bella Vista
•     Barclay Prime, Rittenhouse
•     Ela, Queen Village

Source : http://www.phillymag.com/foobooz/50-best-restaurants/#M8e8D02gjHPS62HX.99

APOCALYPSE

I am in Kolkata now. It is 10:20 PM. I have 4 more days left in the city. After that I am again, leaving on a jet plane.

Right now thanks to the Nov 8 declaration of demonitization of Rs500 and Rs1000 by our Hon'ble Prime Minister the entire country is in a cash strife on the verge of a cash riot. There have been 25 deaths due to this and yet most educated middle-class and upper middle-class young Indians who have access to plastic and e-money are supporting it. And the poor and the old are the ones who are as usual the collateral damage.

In the United States of America where I have to go back and spend atleast the next 1.5 years the country has elected a racist, misogynist, abusive, sexual predator as their President over the most qualified candidate of all time. Perhaps because it was a She. But right now the verdict is clear. The majority of the white population do not want anybody else to be there. Racism and hate crimes have come into the forefront of even the most liberal cities and suburbs.

And I am not even going to start talking about Brexit, Bangladesh, Myanmar, ISIS, Syria, Israel, German Nationalist Party. I guess this is what apocalypse feels like.

And I am sad. Really sad. That I have to leave my bed, my house, my parents behind. I never felt like this before. But I do now. My parents seem so much more frail and withered and with every passing day I am scared that I might not be able to see them if I am not around. The logical part of my brain knows that it has to happen. But I don't want it to happen. I don't want to have to face it or deal with it. I just feel helpless and melancholy and doomed. Yes ! I feel DOOMED. I have gone through much worse before in my life and I have encountered this feeling before. But I could always bring myself out of it. Just this time it does not feel like it will be possible and most importantly it does not feel like I want to.

And yes 2016. YOU SUCKED!! SO BAD!! SO VERY BAD!!

Does it ever get better?

আমি ঢাকা

I had gotten my visa extension about two months back and the first thoughts in my head were I have to go home. To kolkata. I had asked my manager then only but finally that Friday morning my manager came up to me and said I could look to go back home end of October if I wanted. That's all I needed. I booked my tickets within the next 5 hours. The flight is apparently on a Monday and would reach on Tuesday and I would lose two working days. That will affect my utilization and then my rating. But who cares? I am going home. That's what mattered. I decided to meet up CGNC. I had been cooped up inside the house all week.I was just in one of those moods where I did not want to meet anybody and was feeling like a hermit. But the fact that I would be going home needed to be celebrated. It was around 8 in the evening when I met CGNC. I was bursting at my seams. I just blabbered whatever happened throughout the day. Any celebration needs food and that's like a CGNC and me tradition. We meet up once a couple of weeks and go and dine out and make a day/night of it. He listened to me and said you must want Indian food today and to that I told him that what I wanted that day was good bengali food and I went on to add as to why the Bangladeshi/Bangali community here have'nt opened a true-blue Bangladeshi restaurant. And then he said " Hey ! Have you been following what's happening in Bangladesh today." I had read that a Hindu priest was hacked to death the day before and I silently nodded. "Why do you thing their commandos are taking so long to take any action? Why are they not barging into the cafe?"  I realized he was talking about something else. "Cafe? What Cafe?" He replied "A bunch of terrorist have stormed some cafe in some city in Bangladesh. I can't remember the name. The ISIS have claimed responsibility."

I was only half listening to him. I was already too busy trying to find the details on my phone. Bangladesh. I could not believe it. I know politically, geographically it is a different country but I have always felt that it's not that different. I mean, everyone in my mother's side of the family converse in fluent "bangal". How many times have I heard my pishi telling me "এহ তুই  মিষ্টি  খাস না . তুইও  বাঙ্গাল তোর  মা'র  মতন ."

All kidding apart. We speak the same language, eat the same food, share the same history, are nourished by the same river. We are the same.

And then I found out. A cafe in Dhaka. Dhaka! I had always imagined it to be like a soul-sister city to Kolkata. You know how we read about "সই " in old books. Something like that. I don't know why. But I needed more information.
More information than that there were Italians and Japanese citizens trapped inside the cafe. I needed more information than, the RAB was standing right outside waiting to take action. I needed to know who were inside. Who were those people. I needed to know how many terrorists. And yes I desperately needed to know what the RAD was still waiting outside for. I needed real-time update. Sitting in the U.S we keep getting real-time updates about a Bangladesh-India cricket match. Why not about this? Why not about what is happening in Bangladesh? If this was Paris or Brussels or Orlando, then there would be updates..that would have been the only news flooding my feed.

And then I went to Bengali daily news sites. And then I got what I was looking for. I don't even know what I was looking for anymore. I learnt about Arushi. And Arushi's friend. Farhaaz Hossain. The boy who could have left and saved his own life. But chose to stay back because of his friends and was hacked to death. The boy who was just 20 and far wiser and braver and noble than any one of us could ever be. But then the boy who hacked Farhaaz to his death was like Farhaaz and yet so unlike him. Nibras Islam, Rohan Imtiaz and Meer Saameh Mubasheer. They were not older than 23 themselves. They have studied in the best schools, travelled, and have been exposed to the world. Yet, they were completely okay with dying, because they believed they would go to heaven. More scarily, they were completely okay with hacking someone who was exactly like them. to death, not shoot them, but hack them with a machete, in the name of religion. Someone they might have had common friends with. Someone they could have easily had a conversation with, or shared a cuppa joe with, in some cafe.

But instead all of them lie dead. All of their lives cut short by machetes or bullets, brutally. And all, directly or indirectly because of this arbitarary "thing" called religion.

And that brings me to the point I have found hard to shake off my system. A point which would offend a lot of people. Everyone I know, have strongly condemned and been shaken by what happened in Bangladesh. But then there are many among them who are also strongly religious. Devout Hindus, Muslims, Christians and/or Sikhs. And to them I want to ask and this is a genuine question. Not an abstract condescending one. What is the point? What is the point about having a religion?

I really don't know the answer. All I know is that it could have been me. I am just like any of them. It could have been me sitting in a cafe with my friends, when a bunch of religious fanatics might decide to storm in and hack people to death. I don't know if they would have decided to spare me if I identified as Hindu or a Bengali or not. All I know is that I would bleed too. I already am. Because at some level I might not be as brave as Farhaaz Hossain or as cruel and clueless as Nibras Islam, but I am still them. Maybe not exactly. But still. A lot like them.

Ladies Last

CM is a very simple girl or perhaps a woman who happens to be a consultant. CM has worked 5.5 years in the same project 4 years in India and 1.5 years from the client location. CM has worked very hard and shown her merit and has gotten good reviews and ratings 4 out of those 5.5 years including her very last appraisal.

Incidentally CM is the only one belonging to the XX chromosomes gene pool and works with 12 other people who are XY chromosomes.

This incident is one particular incident that happened one particular day but is quite indicative of the kind of behaviour CM, and I am sure most other women have to constantly face at work.


So on this day a very senior lead from CM's India office visits CM's client location. A meeting is obviously arranged. Most meetings like this are CM's nightmare. So the senior lead walks in to the meeting room. Let us call him GD. He sits down and he says, "This is the third team I am meeting and this is the thing with every team. 1 ' LADIES' and rest 'GENTLEMEN'. Is this your plan? But there is no gender bias here and so no Ladies First Business here. "

Everyone around the table laughs a little. CM forces resemblance of a smile.

The meeting continues with expression of gratitude but also the dire times ahead. How the (human)resources have worked hard but ofcourse need to work harder. How they should expand their horizon and no not go travelling, but find new problems in the client architecture so that they can make the clients realize how inadequate they are and then give the client the solutions themselves like the great Houdini and let them know how indispensable CM's team specifically and her company in general are. Ofcourse it ends with the future prospects of CM's company and the new projects that they have acquired. The two recent large projects acquired by CM's company are two luxury brands. One related to Women's beauty product and the other is a well know designer brand for handbags. And GD concludes with "We should find this exciting specially the Ladies right?" He looks at CM and smiles. Now CM has learnt to keep her mouth shut in situations like this. Except CM's expressions gets the better of her sometimes. To CM it obviously does not matter if her company has acquired the project of a client who sells overpriced (and overhyped) handbags or a client who sells toilet cleaners as long as it means that her company gets revenues and profits which percolates down to her. Just one sentence escapes CM's lips. "Ofcourse. Since they will be giving us LADIES free stuff."

Everyone in the room starts laughing. CM wonders if they are laughing at the sarcasm or they think that is actually funny.