I know Cricket!

Not only day starts at wrong time in the US. Everything is wrong here.. If you are an Indian you would definitely think so! We have nothing in common. Absolutely nothing. We may be driving wrong way for all these years but always drive from the 'right' side.. these people drive right but well on the wrong side. We like to paint our roads red (power windows are for that only) but these people paint their roads with all kinds of messages and signs. 'Yield'! reads a sign at a crossroad near my apartment. Yield.. when I first read it I thought I should have WordWeb dictionary on my mobile! How can you use such difficult words to induce sudden halt of a speeding car! It sounds like you have riot police standing on the road. blocking your way and shouting 'YEILD'! These people don't stop there next they say 'State policy'! I was wondering Will 'Thamba! Rajyacha Kayda' do the same thing in Pune? Anyway, that's the different topic altogether.

People come to office in cars of all shapes and sizes here. Indian milk van type cars can be seen parked outside an IT office. Certainly this is not at all possible back home. If we bring our Nano here It will be used in garden for toddlers!

Apart from on the road they have signs all over the place. Here I want to tell my brothers and sisters from Pune If you think you're the best in the business then you need to come to America. You are like Graeme Hick or Darren Lehmann when it comes to putting up signs.. you always scored heavily at your home but there are masters outside! You have a lot of catching up to do!
'Caution! Someone may be coming from the other side!' Cautioning a person entering a loo! How cruel! Other side of the same door says, 'Push door slowly' it's better as you read that after you're done with your work! 'Cafeteria Closes at 2' I reached their at 2.01 lady at the counter gave me Ice cream sandwich and said 'I am allowing you to buy this because this is just one minute past and I am still at the counter' Punekars can you beat this?

That day I went to Bank Of America to open my account. An African American lady was at the desk. (And yes.. I not making any racial remarks here! just want you people to paint clearer picture!) That lady was wonderful and lovely to talk to. She took my passport 'Is this Kee-Tan?' I said in Marathi madhyam uchchar 'Ketan' and my team lead in his Tamil said 'KeTan' at the same time! She got it right! Then she went ahead and asked 'is this your surname?' Well this is another difference people here talk full sentences at banks and public places. They say 'How may help you? and don't just take their hand forward to demand passbook from you! Ohh yes I said to the lady at the bank, 'AapTe'.
'You people say A as O in India?'
'No it's Aa AapTe'
'Aaaapte!'
'This is one of the easiest Indian surnames for you'
'Ohh yeah certainly! Some of them are horror'

BofA has this different thing. You have to choose a picture which is shown to you each time you log in to your account. I was looking for some baseball or basketball pic. Then I asked her, 'You know cricket?
'Ohh yeah I know that!'
'Have you seen it?'
'Ohh many times.. it's just lovely little thing which sits on the rock!'

That's why I say we have nothing in common. Nothing not even English!

The Journey

After Long Journey (Lost the count after changing so many time zones J) I am finally at Infosys Office at Bentonville.

Journey was boring at times in the plane but was good overall. My journey started with Rakesh Roshan passing by my side at waiting area at Mumbai Airport. Plane was big and crowded. I couldn’t sleep much as the leg room was worse than in the bus. Saw great city of London from the sky. The city was beautiful with lots of greenery around. Heathrow airport is really huge with 5 terminals. Each one is amost of the size of Mumbai airport. There were people from all over the world. Indians were all over the place be it handling check in baggage, security checks, Forex counters, washrooms and what not. I decided not sit idle and to see as much Heathrow as I could and saw Paro and director of Dev D (kalki and Anurah Kashyap) walking together J. This airport was huge. Planes were landing almost a minute.

After quite enjoyable stay of 4 hours at Heathrow I boarded the plane to Dallas. Now after having Indian airhostesses and Public Announcements done in Hindi along with English, this was truly international experience with all British crew and majority of American travellers. A middle aged Mexican lady was sitting next to me who was talking in Spanish with everyone and saying Gracias to me at my every small gesture of help!

My plane took off from London and flew till Manchester before escaping through narrow channel in water between Scotland and Ireland and believe or not I saw both the Old Traffords (Cricket and Football) at Manchester! My halt at UK paid off!

After some 2 hours long journey, I saw some snow covered mountains coming out of Atlantic Ocean... and route map showed in my plane said that it was the sounthernmost tip if Greenland! My plane entered American continent through Canada and entered US at the Great Lakes. While landing at Dallas I saw huge truck running on US Highway with Wal-Mart written on it! :)

Then at Dallas Airport we all went to Customs and Immigration area. Where again there were Indians Mexicans, Chinese, Eurpoeans, Africans. We had already filled the form in the plane which I submitted to the officer after few simple formal questions and fingerprinting done he gave me clearance to claim my baggage. After collecting my bags I went for secutiry check for domestic flight I had to catch to reach North West Arkansas Airport.

There was a train which i had to board to reach to Domestic terminal. The domestic plane was really small and I rejected the food offered to me after eating whaterver offered to my in first two flights. I found one more Infoscion sitting beside me. We chatted for some time and after landing went to our respective places in the same cab. Got the first time experience of Left hand drive! :)


This place is just like village. Has lots of beautiful houses with lawns in front of them. Has clean and wide and smooth roads.


Got the key after reaching to my apartment. It is nice flat and currently I am the only occupant as the other guy has gone on a week long holiday.


I slept very less in my journey which is actually helping me to combat Jet Lag! So I got nice sleep at US night time! :)


Next update coming soon! Till then Cya!