Air (un)conditioning

I moved to a new home in December, then started traveling for work. I thought that once I am back in March, I will set up the home, buy nice furniture, buy an air conditioner. I was about to spend part of the summer in the US and Germany anyway, so I did not bother. 

And then, the pandemic happened.

Now, I am stuck in the 45 Celsius (and rising) heat, without an AC. And this is only May. This house is so intelligently built, it is freezing in the winter and blazing in the summer. Add to it cooking, cleaning, and all the household chores that make you hotter (pun unintended). Even in the middle of the night, the fan lets off a plume of hot air from the overheated ceiling. The mattress absorbs all the heat. I have never had so much hotness in life. 

I’ve moved my makeshift bed to every room to see which one feels a little better- the ground floor bedroom, the ground floor living room, or the upstairs bedroom. The suffering is all the same. 

I’ve considered sleeping on the open rooftop, but fear being bitten by bugs and mosquitoes. Worse, imagine waking up and seeing a monkey sidling up to you. I’ve also considered sleeping in the office, either on the floor or atop my wooden desk, but fear the bugs, the hiding lizards, and my own snoring alerting the security guards and a consequent email on the notice board the next day. 

Everything I cut for food, I try applying it on my face to see if it would cool me down. Cucumbers, lemons, melons, and papaya have worked out great! Tip: Cauliflowers and eggplants don’t help!

I updated my playlist to play all the Raag Megh Malhar songs. And it started raining in Kolkata!

Watering the plants is my favorite chore now. Most of the water goes on me.

I’m fantasizing about an ice bucket challenge. Right now, I could eat ice for breakfast, lunch and dinner. 

I am trying to look at the positive side. Less electricity bills. Absolutely no need to work out. Reliving childhood nostalgia when we had no AC.

When most people around the world are working from home, I am going to office every day. Even on weekends and holidays. I stay there as long as I can, staring at the AC and fantasizing about stealing it.  

I keep watching winter videos of Switzerland on Youtube, hoping that it helps. It has. By now, I know all the names of the Swiss counties. There is nothing left for me to see in Switzerland anymore. 

Some activities are a complete no-no. Not getting embroiled in Facebook fights. No reading romantic stories. No watching kissing scenes in movies. No horny thoughts. Complete abstinence from all activities that tend to raise the body temperature. 

I look at old pictures of me wading in the snow the one terrible winter I spent in Nebraska, hoping that it will produce some cooling effect. 

I chant this mantra to myself, “Evaporation causes cooling!” 50 times every day while sweating, hoping that all this positivity will get me through till the end of summer in November. Here is another one. Close your eyes. Imagine there has been a power cut. Now open your eyes. Look at the ceiling fan still working with gratitude. You will not feel as hot after that. 

I think of life as a Bikram hot yoga class, a meditation retreat, or a tropical vacation. People pay a lot of money to get some of these experiences. I’m getting it for free. 

sunshine

Country Rap

Have you noticed how Bengali expats who congregate with other Bengali expats at the airport and bond while bitching about how India will never improve usually share certain common attributes?

One, they usually wear GAP or Nike clothing.

Two, the farther they get from the US (or the closer they get to India), the louder their rants get. They might not be as vocal in Houston or Seattle but will be very loud in Dubai. Perhaps the humid Dubai air makes them realize that shit is about to get real in a few hours.

Three, the rants are always, always in English. Ninde korar belaye accent diye Ingriji.

Based on what people say, it is easy to predict who is who.

"Ayi saala suorer bachcha plane ta deri koralo" -- A Bengali from India.

"Can't believe nothing runs on time. It's always sooo hard to get things done in India. This country will never improve" -- naak oonchoo expat whose patriotism is confined to missing and discussing aam jaam lichu tyangra lyangra on Facebook but dreads every moment of their trip to India. 

A curious spectator (sunshine).

On being one's boss

As the train rolled into the station close to two in the morning, almost an hour behind schedule, I pressed my nose to the window pane trying to make out as much of the city as the view would allow. Silhouettes of tall buildings stood as vanguard in the downtown landscape. Traffic lights blinked red and green and occasional cars waited and sped by in otherwise empty streets. Little local stores stood in the darkness dwarfed by larger ones. There wasn't much to make of the city in the dark.

It took another hour to get home, home being a temporary arrangement of sorts. As I debated whether to fully unpack or wait until I moved to a more permanent place in a few weeks or months, the philosophical voice in my head (also known as brain chatter) told me to go ahead and unpack since all homes are temporary anyway. Running alarmingly low on energy, I was glad for all the home-cooked food G had meticulously packed me (even including dessert) as one would do before sending off their kid to college.

After struggling to fall asleep between delirious bouts of tossing in bed, I finally did in the wee hours of dawn. Despite my ambitious plans of showing up at work by 8, that never happened. I slept fitfully for the next few hours, to wake up and realize that I feel even more tired. I walked up to the window and drew the blinds to get my first view of the neighborhood. It looks like any American suburban neighborhood, at least the ones I have seen. Pretty family homes with yards full of potted plants and trees adding color to the fall season. A little grocery store at walking distance which is a huge relief for someone with restricted mobility. Except for the occasional whir of cars stopping and rolling at the Stop sign, there are no sounds at all. No people, no view of the sea and no ships sailing by. I live thousands of miles away from Germany now.

Thus began life in another prison as I molted and liberated myself out of the last one.

Day one at work was very unusual. I never made it to work. Exhaustion induces sleep in a way more potent than drugs or alcohol. I never became fully awake or cognizant of the world until about 4 pm. Just that "poor thing, she is jet lagged and tired" will not take me very far.

Day two: So as not to repeat what happened on day one, I woke up at 5 in the morning and got ready to take the 7 am bus. I was on campus well before 8, only to get stuck because there was no one to let me in. The day was spent mostly doing paperwork. ID cards and visa stuff, setting up computers and emails. It is amazing how much time all this takes. People came by to say hello and introduce themselves. It is pretty much getting married and being a new bride. People show up in hordes to meet you, smile, say how pretty you are (in this case, how fortunate they are to have me) and asking me if I remember them (from the interview). As a new bride/employee, I have to do my homework. I have to know names and faces and be able to match the correct name to face, pretty much like the old aunt of a distant cousin who says, “Remember me?” I have to be familiar with what research they do so that I don’t look lost when they talk. This is also the time when people want to rope you in collaborations since you are new and they want to help you. It is always good to memorize everyone’s CVs.

But here is the strangest thing about being a professor. Suddenly, you don’t have an advisor. No one tells you what to do and you are your own boss. The feeling can sometimes be quite confusing especially since all this while, you are used to looking for validation. Most people respond in two ways. Either they get off the tangent and don’t work as much, or they try to over-compensate and work too hard. Striking the right balance is the key.

It feels like a decade’s worth of training leads up to this final moment of being an independent researcher and faculty member. It’s liberating and scary at the same time. At home, I feel like a little child, cowering and clueless. But when I go to work, I put on my best clothes, my confidence, and show that I am sharp, smart, and bright. It’s a show, a mask I put on until I can figure out how to effortlessly navigate my way around.

I thought that the brightest spot of my day was finding a bus that runs from home to work (not having to drive in America is a rare luxury). It became even brighter when I was issued a card that would let me ride the bus for free. Little joys in life.

sunshine

My condition has a name

The thing with Condor Airlines (international, not domestic) is that they ask you money for headphones, have an amazing movie collection of exactly two (a horrible chick flick and an animation movie) unless you pay, and don't even let you choose between chicken or pasta if you are at the rear end of the plane (they just run out of chicken). With the bad food, cheap plastic that would have broken while slicing chicken anyway, and the terribly cramped leg space, I am glad that they don't ask money for using the bathrooms. With 11 hours to kill on my flight from Germany to the USA, I decide to watch the movies with English subtitles and no audio anyway, only to realize that while all that Cameron Diaz and two other women did was wear skimpy clothes and plot to avenge the man who was sleeping with all three of them (such intellectually stimulating stuff!), they played the captions from a WWII movie the entire time. Diaz wades into the ocean in a bikini and someone talks about bombing Berlin and moving in to Poland.

Having said that, there were no major mishaps and I did reach Seattle fine. G was at the airport with the kids. The 3-year old kicked me in excitement, got confused between our names, and called me her name. We struggled to load the two huge bags risking herniated uteri, G rightly asking me if there are bodies hiding in those bags. "No, just kilos of German chocolates to last me the year," I replied. The only reason I got away not paying extra for heavily overweight bags is because I made a sad face and told the kind lady at the airport that I am leaving Germany for good. My German bank (can't say enough good things about them, sarcastically though) decided to give me back my entire savings of two years in 50 euro bills. I am serious. Risking thieves (remember Greece from not too long ago?), random bag checks, or emergency plane evacuations, I had to get very creative about transporting thousands of euro in cash.

Seattle is a brief pit stop before I head to my final destination. I have been missing Germany more than I thought. It feels strange that no one is speaking German anymore, people are not stinking of cigarettes, and restaurants are serving water even without asking. Even more surprisingly, I see Indians walking on the streets for a change. In a funny way, I do feel like an alien (in the USA, they call people like me alien), only from another planet. I got to eat comfort food like idli and biryani at G’s place after months. I am getting a little bit of cold feet right now with this new chapter starting for real this week and have been jet-lagged and up since 2 am every day. I am not sleeping well. Often, I start planning what all I need to pack when I go back from Seattle to Germany. Only that I don’t have to go back to Germany anymore. My brain refuses to acknowledge that I am back in the USA for good. For two years, I shuttled between Seattle and Germany, praying that I make it back, bringing German chocolates and taking back my favorite stuff from Seattle (for example, seaweed from Costco). It does not feel any different this time. Of course I am not schizophrenic and do not live in an alternate reality. So it is easy for me to realize this and quickly switch back to reality. Within a few hours of arriving, I have a cell phone and I am using a credit card and microwave. For two years, I used none of these (I used the credit card only to purchase international flight tickets, daily purchases in Germany happened using cash). It feels like someone has pressed the reset button in my life from 2014 (when I left the USA exactly this month). In a heartfelt conversation with a close friend, I told her although I did everything in my capacity to move back to the USA with a job, I am just not able to calm down or feel like I have really moved back. She told me that I am suffering the sure shot signs of post-traumatic stress disorder.

The funny thing is, I will have to take a driving test again, both writing and practical. It feels like being in college and having to study for fifth grade. It’s not good enough that I drove extensively for many years before I left the US. It’s amazing how many hoops I have to jump just to settle in before starting the most challenging job of my life. Right now, my brain feels like it has been centrifuged and pulverized. I feel exhaustion way more than excitement. I am mostly navigating in auto-pilot mode, reminding myself to take deep breaths again and again. PTSD, it definitely is.

sunshine

Small Talk

Small talk is probably cultural. Because the content of small talk, although mostly meaningless, varies across cultures. While talking to many in Kolkata, a question I am often asked is, "Ki kheyechish?" What have you eaten? It always baffles me. First, it takes me some time to even remember what I last ate. But then, how does it matter what I ate? Not that you are going to eat it too. How is the knowledge important? I keep forgetting that this is small talk. It has no meaning, no purpose, perhaps other than a cultural basis because food is considered god (Annapurna) and having enough to be able to eat well is a sign of prosperity. The other question is "Kothaye jachhish?" Where are you headed? This also perhaps comes from the imagination of a tighter-knit society where everyone used to watch out for one another. If a woman is venturing out alone, one needs to know where she is headed. I don't think my dad will get asked this question as much though. It still takes me by surprise when someone I barely know asks me this question. Maybe they do not care about the answer. It is just small talk after all.

In this part of the world that is Germany, when we make small talk, we talk about the weather a lot. What a lovely day it is! What a gloomy day it is. The weekend is going to be nice. August and so cold already? When we meet at work first thing in the morning, we talk of the weather. When we meet in the office kitchen to heat up our coffee, we talk about the weather. It could be perhaps because it is so cold for most part of the year that good weather makes news. But then, bad weather also makes news. It is cultural after all. No one talks about the weather with as much gusto in Kolkata. 

Talking about weather, the week started on an extremely cold note. The first day, I went to work shivering. I still did not want to believe it, I thought that it was a figment of my imagination. This is early-August after all, and only last week, I was wearing summery clothes. So I conveniently told myself that I am so cold perhaps because I am PMSing, or the hypothalamus (the temperature regulator) in my brain has blown off a fuse. The tendency to point to the self for everything gone wrong around you is also perhaps cultural. When I boarded the bus on Monday, my teeth chattering despite my jeans and full sleeved shirt, everyone in the bus was giving me strange looks. They were all wearing sweatshirts, jackets, with snug fitting tights and woolen socks. It was reassuring to know that my hypothalamus wasn't malfunctioning after all.

I continued to chatter and shiver to work the next few days. The leaves are still green, and it is nowhere close to fall. How can winter come before fall? Just like at first I did not believe the eminent signs of winter in August and blamed it on PMS, I also didn't believe that my new work visa is still not here. I am officially to start work next week. I have started to get all the group emails from my new workplace that start with "Dear faculty members,..." Wait, am I still a postdoc? Or am I already a faculty? It's probably as confusing as being single for a larger part of your life, and then suddenly one day, not being single anymore. The rational mind knows, but belief takes longer to sink in. But how is waiting for a visa related to not wearing winter clothes? Well, you see, my suitcases are all packed and ready to be shipped. I neatly packed and weighed and labeled them back in May, when it was the peak of summer. I was about to ship my stuff in June, hoping to open them in the US by now. Thank god an inner voice asked me not to ship them so soon. After four days of living and shivering in denial, I finally came home to open those bags and take out my winter clothes today, all neatly folded. Although I am slowly exhausting all my kitchen supplies (rice got over yesterday), I keep telling myself that maybe I could wait a few more days before I start restocking on the grains. Maybe a few more days, and I will not need to buy anything. What a shame it would be to leave things behind. I keep reminding myself to stay calm, keep breathing, and not lose perspective because there are greater troubles than a delayed work start that afflict the world right now. I have a job to be thankful for. I keep telling myself not to lose hope and enjoy my last few [insert time span] in Germany. However, I find it a little hard to stay calm right now. Because just like me, my apartment manager hasn't realized that it is freezing cold already. She hasn't turned on the central heating, making me cocoon inside the only two blankets I have. It's a relief that I have a candle that still has a few hours of life left. As I write this, I am cupping my hands every few minutes and holding them by the flame for some much needed warmth. Because my fingertips are freezing already. I have a feeling that I will have to stock up on candles sooner than rice. 

 sunshine

A post in questions

Whatever you are doing right now, pause for a moment to sit back and think of this question.

“What would you do if the biggest problem plaguing your life right now is taken care of right away?”

The problem could be anything, but had to the biggest one in your life right now. What if you got the job you wanted in the city you wanted as well? What if your ailing child suffering from autism is miraculously cured? What if you found the person after waiting in loneliness for years? What if you got into Harvard Medical School? What if you got pregnant after years of trying? What if after being estranged for years, you and your partner got together? What if all your financial worries are taken care of?

In short, what if that one biggest thing worrying you right now is solved? How would your life look like from tomorrow? Would you go back to living a carefree, cheerful, fearless life just the way you wanted it? Would you start doing the things you promised you would when your worries are taken care of? Or like fluids, would the rest of the worries occupy the empty space in your life now?

I am not asking this question to the readers as much as I am asking it to myself. I wonder if I might temporarily start lacking a purpose, a direction in life if my biggest worry for the moment is taken care of.

sunshine

Kon-Maried

My parents are worried about the recent change they saw in me where stuff and clutter makes me uncomfortable and jittery. I am ready to get rid of anything I possibly could. In Kolkata, I bought nothing other than perishable food to bring back. I left behind most gifts that people gave me this time. I am always after my parents, urging them to throw away things, constantly annoyed by that non-functional treadmill that continues to stay in the living room as a makeshift clothes rack, more to appease the guilt of my family for not exercising. I made Ma promise that I will only enter that home the next time the treadmill is gone. I think that sitting there and doing nothing, it just brings bad energy.

My dad could not believe that I spent 500 rupees buying Marie Kondo's book, "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" to actively learn how to declutter. They don't get it because they have never lived out of suitcases. They have never had to pack up their life within a week and move because their visa was not approved. I exactly know that this difference in mentality is coming from having had radically different life experiences. My Ma was telling me today how they often argue about whether to sleep in this apartment or that apartment (there are two on the same floor, one is south facing and has more breeze at night, and the other is east facing and gives a nice view of the sunrise). The irony of the timing of her comment is not lost on me when my apartment lease in Germany is going to end pretty soon, leaving the possibility that I might be homeless.

Let's see what interesting experiences life brings after my lease ends in July.

sunshine

The need for Plan B

People often stress the need of having a plan in life. I have gotten away without a plan many times. What helped me is having a Plan B instead of an overall plan.

I timed my return to Germany from Kolkata to have my US paperwork ready. I would have been in Berlin this week getting a visa, and getting ready to move. But that did not happen. The paperwork is delayed and I must wait. Had I known, I would have spent more time in Kolkata. So what do I do now?

I spent the day staring at Google Maps until I had a plan. Sunday 5 am, I sleepily hopped on a long-distance train, and continued to sleep in the cramped seats until my neck was almost dislocated. I got on the road for a week, traveling in trains and seeing new countries. Hungary. Slovakia. Poland. Close your eyes and touch the European map and you could be wherever you please.

This was not even a part of my conscious until Friday, let alone be a part of my plan. But since Plan A is taking forever, I decided to make the best use of my time. And why not? I brought my work with me. I am seeing places I have no spiritual connection with and have no reason to see otherwise. The hostel in Budapest has an interesting balcony lining the inner perimeter of the building (If you have seen Julie Delpy's "2 days in Paris", this building looks exactly like that). A good looking young man was on the phone at the other end of the balcony for a long time this morning, wearing nothing but his boxers, unaware that he had a curious spectator. Imagine waking up to a view like that. Ma would have said, "Why are you spending money, you could have lazed around at home.” She has a point, but this might be a good plan to have at age eighty.

From perfect jobs to understanding partners, healthy and well-behaved children, efficient cars and cozy homes, we want to have it all. But life isn't perfect, mine far from it. I've set my heart on things that never happened, giving way to things instead I had never considered. Doing a PhD was my Plan B. Moving to Germany was my Plan B. Learning to drive was my Plan B (I was so scared that I resisted it for years). Learning to travel alone was my Plan B. It all worked out great. If life had been predictable, I’d be a resident of the Bay Area in California whose husband works in one of the software companies, owning a townhouse, driving a Lexus, rearing American children, taking them to piano and ballet lessons and celebrating Durga Puja with the fellow “probashi” or non-resident Bengalis, whining about how dirty India is and how corrupt the politicians are. But my life is not predictable, far from it thankfully. I can be homeless and jobless in a day. I can also plan a road trip to any European country in a day. My life is that steroid-driven. So Plan B for me is absolutely possible. Why possible, it is the Plan Bs that have kept me going, making my life interesting and different from the rest.

sunshine

Homelessness

This morning, I re-signed my rental lease, shortening it to the end of July. An immediate and familiar feeling of fear hit my stomach. My paperwork for the US visa is taking forever, and it might happen that by the time my documents arrive and I have to go to the US consulate in Germany, my German job contract is over and I might not have a place to live in anymore. Am I looking at potential homelessness post-July again? It has happened before. The first time was for 3 months when I was transitioning back to graduate school. For months, people in Seattle opened up their homes as I spent my time babysitting, cat sitting, even house sitting. The second time was right before moving to Germany when I had spent 4 weeks on the road. Every day, I slept in a new place, in supercomputer labs at universities, people's homes, seedy hotel rooms with names scribbled on distastefully done wall papers in the hinterlands of Wyoming, and even sometimes inside my car. Every time a major transition in my life happened, I became homeless, although momentarily. However, that was the US where I have hundreds of friends, where G will open up her home and kitchen indefinitely in return for digging up her garden, doing yard work, painting the walls, cleaning the garage, breaking coconuts, lugging heavy grocery from Cash n Carry, freezing myself while getting milk cans from the Costco freezer, and accompanying her to every temple within a 200-mile radius (I have done it all). Germany is different. I hardly know anyone in Germany, especially outside work. Without a cell phone, it will be even more fun.

However, these transition periods also open up possibilities of newer, unique experiences. With no paycheck and not much money to stay in hotels, I might go backpacking and sleep in overnight trains (some of those trains in Prague have showers too). I might start sleeping in my office and use the emergency shower in the biology lab. I might invest in a tent, backpack and sleeping bag. There are nice benches in the park right outside my home. If nothing, there is always Kolkata to go back to.

sunshine

Old place, new things

I am not stranger to Kolkata. It annoys me every time I land at the airport and stand in line for immigration, always surrounded by a bunch of NRIs who cannot stop complaining about how slow the line is moving or how Kolkata is never going to change or flash their foreign passports to get ahead in line. Yes, the first thing I step out of the plane, I smell the warm, humid air mixed with phenyl/floor-cleaning chemicals. And that is the smell I associate with the airport, my gateway to my home. When in the US, I used to visit annually. Now from Germany, I visit almost twice a year. But every time I visit, there are certain things I relearn or unlearn. Day 1 is always the hardest, reorienting myself to a different, if not new way of doing things. It's like a switch in the brain that turns on and off. Here are some of the things that always surprise me anew in Kolkata.

1. Sweating. Every time I step out of the airport, my glasses fog. And I slowly start sweating. It's an alien feeling, since I do not sweat in Germany. Not even for a minute, unless I am working out seriously. The seasons are differentiated by the number of blankets and comforters I heap on myself, and summer means using only one instead of three. So suddenly when I am standing outside the airport, not lifting anything or working out and I start sweating, my clothes clinging to me, the feeling is very disconcerting. 

2. Roads. It takes my brain a little bit of re-programming to remember that we now drive on the left hand side of the road. It always surprises me how much smaller, bumpier, and un-geometrical the roads look. The first few times of crossing the roads without signal are scary, and I involuntarily look for the traffic lights with the red hand or the green man walking. It doesn't take long to unlearn the western ways and relearn the Indian way though. On our way from the airport this time, dad asks me if I see something different about the roads. Unmindful and still thinking about why I am sweating, I reply, "Yes, it's so much smaller and we are on the left, which is freaking me out." Dad was pointing out to how much cleaner and organized the roads now look, with road signs and all, thanks to our chief minister. His message was completely lost on me. 

3. Mosquitoes. Two days after I arrived, I woke up one morning, my right arm completely riddled with mosquito bites. In a strange way, it felt very nostalgic. Sensing a mosquito that’s sitting on my leg and killing it without seeing it is a skill that has taken me years to master. I don’t even know why we switch on the electronic mosquito repellant. I don’t think it works.

4. Lizards. I am used to staying up late. I am also used to raiding the fridge at night. Often, when I switch on the kitchen light, I see a lizard or two quickly crawl by on the floor. We have learnt to accept each other's existence. It feels assuring to know that someone else is up and scouring for food as well this late.

5. The ceiling fan. Eventually, when I am done working, I switch off the laptop and the tube light before hitting the bed. In bed, I lie on my back, looking at the silhouette of the ceiling fan moving. And I always wonder what if it falls on me? I wonder when they last serviced the fan and how well they checked the screws suspending it. Sometimes, I am afraid that my thoughts alone will change an unlikely event into a likely one. So I try to think of something else until I fall asleep. However, every time I lie down, I always wonder if I should switch it off.

6. The door bell. It’s amazing how many times the door bell rings here. In Germany, I don’t think I even have a door bell. If I am expecting someone, they just call beforehand.  There is no domestic help or newspaper person or mailman or the plumber or electrician to ring the bell.

7. Food. I am always thrilled by how much stronger fruits and vegetables smell here- garlic, ginger, onions, mangoes. My hand smells of food all day long. Back there, fruits and vegetables are four times the size, but hardly have any smell.

8. Wet bathroom floors. This is one more thing that takes me some time to get used to. The fact that there is always water on the floors. And buckets, yes. I don’t have any buckets or mugs back in Germany.

9. The domestic help. In Germany, I am the cook and I am the cleaner. I do the dishes and clean the floors. I wash my own clothes. I make my tea. Not here.

10. The clothes line. I do not have one back there. The dryer dries my clothes, although I feel so much better drying my clothes in the sunlight.

There are so many more, including experiencing extended periods of time when there could be no water or no electricity or no internet or all of the above. Electricity-wise, it is so much better than it used to be when we were children. I actually miss those one hour in the evening summer power outages when I would do nothing but lie on the terrace, looking up and admiring the night sky and the blinking airplanes while riddled with mosquito bites.

sunshine

Unit(ed)

The unit conversion cells in my brain have never been more active until I moved to Deutschland. There are some I never adopted in the US in the first place, so it feels comforting to revert after all these years. For example, I always understood weather or temperature in Celsius and not Fahrenheit. So when you say that 32 is a cold day and 85 is a hot day, it does not make any sense to me. For me, 0 means cold and 100 means hot. The weather channel is always set to degree C. And although I weigh things in pounds at the grocery store, I always weigh myself in kilograms because that made more sense to me. 60 was great, 100 was fatal, and anything in between was a work in progress in either direction. Weighing babies or milk in ounces confuse me even more. 

Then, there are new things I learnt in the US, like driving. So buying gas in gallons, measuring distance in miles, or speed in miles/hour makes so much more sense to me. I just had to see the number 60 to know that I was fine, or 80 to know that I should really slow down. Now, the autobahn sometimes specifies a speed of 120 (km/hour). If I did not know the unit, it would freak me out. I am relearning what it means to measure distance in kilometers or area of rooms in square meters (and not square feet). After many years, I am buying milk in liters. And weighing vegetables in kilograms. 

The mm/dd/yy has gone back to dd/mm/yy, but I see that after the first few years of instinctively writing dd/mm in the US, I am now instinctively writing mm/dd in Germany. Earlier, I was converting USD to INR and back, but now, it is a mishmash of USD to Euro, Euro to INR, INR to USD, and what not. 

And time. Here in Germany, I have meetings at 14:30, dinner at 18:30, drink coffee at 16:30, and go to bed at 21:30. There is no concept of am and pm. Even the computers show the time from a scale of 00 to 24 hours. This is something very new to me. 

sunshine

(Fun)eral

I am sick today. Nothing earth shattering, just a bad cold and fever. I realized that no matter how much fun living alone is, living alone when sick is not fun. It's good to have someone around, even if for purely selfish reasons like fetching food and water and hearing me whine in pain.

Sickness led to morbid thoughts as I lay in bed, too weak to get up. One thought led to another, and I thought, "Shit, what if I die and no one realizes it?" Then I thought, not my problem. I am dead anyway. Why do I care? And I started laughing hysterically. I started thinking more about death, and wondered why people mourn death? Tears. Funeral, followed by a two-week long mourning ceremony when no one eats meat. Why does death have to be so ....... morbid, for lack of a better word?

So I refurbished my funeral, in my head of course. I want all my friends to be there, but more for celebrating my life. No one is going to cry. My brightest picture from some backpacking trip would be up there, and not some sad and sorry looking picture with incense sticks suffocating me! I am a foodie, so there will be my favorite things, goat biryani and Chipotle on the "shraadhho menu" (Funeral ceremony menu). You can remove the meat if you are vegetarian. No weepy shehnai music in the background please, I want Bollywood music, the dancing-type, especially from the 90s. You can all organize a movie night too and watch my favorite movies too.

I used to avidly collect travel magnets until two years ago (when I had a philosophical shift and stopped amassing and getting attached to materials that I cannot eat or drink or smoke or wear or immediately consume). You all are welcome to share the magnets, especially if you were with me on that particular trip. That's probably my most prized possession. I don't own any jewelry, gold or otherwise. Also, be ready to do your homework and share your most hilarious memory of me. Humor is the best thing in the world, and I'd love to watch you cracking a joke or two. If you decide to mail in your memory of me, do take care of the grammar. Don't be lazy and don't use text language. I ha8 ppl wrtng u and urs. Be sure to dress up as if you are going to a colorful party, no white clothes please. You know how much I love wearing colorful sarees.

The one thing I'd have loved though is not for the fainthearted, and will not happen. Asking someone to take me on a cross-country road trip for the final journey.

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Life (and death) lessons

I heard the most poignant words from a friend who recently lost her husband of 5 years and friend of 15 years (same person). 

"How are you dealing with the loss?", I asked her.

She said that every day is different. She takes one day at a time and tries to live normally, rather than wallow in sadness or ask God why it had to be him. While most days are okay, some days are really bad. However, she celebrated Christmas with her family to retain a sense of normalcy, although he passed earlier that month.

And then came the most poignant part. "He was a good man. We had so many happy memories", she said. "While other men complained of shopping, he never complained. He took me shopping, and spent hours looking for clothes or shoes for me or the girls. He didn't like shopping as much, but he always went with me to make me happy."

"And whenever he went grocery shopping, he always brought home something especially for me. My favorite fruits, or my favorite vegetables." 

As she said this, she kept getting agitated once in a while because she could not find the right English word. Every now and then, she frantically typed a German word to find its English meaning. So she sat there pouring her heart out with Google translator open as I bawled unabashedly. She even handed me a tissue. 

They both found love for the second time when they were in their late forties. 

And as I listened to her fondest memories of him, I thought, I don't want someone who'd take me to Paris or Venice or do cross-country road trips. I've been there and done that. I'd rather have someone who brings home my favorite coconut and litchis and avocados, and takes German (or whatever language I'm learning) lessons and practices with me. I think that I'm willing to wait some more for that.

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Losing friends

I lost two of my closest friends to a car accident earlier this year. I have seldom felt grief of this magnitude. The significant people in my family are all alive, and never before has the passing of loved ones left me so lonely, confused, and bewildered.

Based on what little I know about what happened that day, I have constructed my own reality, and replayed the events so many times in my head. Every time, I think of a different sequence of events, but all leading to the same outcome- that they escape unscathed. What if they had decided not to drive, but watch a movie at home? What if they got a flat tire and pulled over? There are thousands of such "what if" outcomes I have played in my head again and again. My pain is possibly not bigger than the pain of their family members. I cannot imagine what they are going through. But it feels like this has left a gaping hole in my heart, a hole that may never mend. I often find myself wondering if this is a bad dream, where I will wake up in the morning and realize that none of this happened. Sometimes, I stare at the water blankly, or walk on the streets without direction, and cry. Sometimes, I go through the hundreds of pictures I had taken of them, imagining them to be somewhere in another world throwing parties, feeding an army, and spreading joy.

This incident has shaken me at two levels. First, the loss of such close friends, people with such magnanimous hearts, people I have nothing but happy memories with, is unbearable. Second, knowing that someone would intentionally drive on the wrong side of the freeway towards oncoming traffic in a state of drunkenness is unimaginable. I wish to get inside the darkest recesses of the perpetrator's mind and understand what was he thinking when he took that U-turn on the freeway. When you are drunk, you stay home. The last thing you do is drive, let alone drive on the wrong side of the freeway. I have been so traumatized that I often find myself looking for traffic in the wrong direction when crossing the road. Sometimes, I feel a moment of a disoriented state, not knowing which way the traffic would be coming from.

I don't know how to snap out of this state of stupor. Sometimes, I think that I should write down everything I remember about them, penning down four years worth of memories to immortalize them in my own way. Writing is therapeutic. They have given me nothing but unalloyed joy, and everything I write will be a happy chapter. Each of us who knew them is going though their own personal journey of processing pain and grief. Each of us has our own trove of happy stories.

One day, Mr. Friend was recounting how Mrs. Friend loved to make conversation for hours, and never hung up the phone soon enough. So one morning when she hung up in 45 minutes, Mr. Friend asked who it was and how come the conversation was so short. Mrs. Friend said, "It was a wrong number."

I could not stop laughing, and asked her if it was true. With all earnestness, she told me that the lady on the other side of the line got comforted by her voice, and poured out her heart. The unknown lady was so miserable, visiting her son and daughter-in-law from another country, feeling stuck at their home because none of them talked to the old woman. Such is the magic of my friends. Even complete strangers felt no hesitation opening up their hearts to them.

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A philosophical rant on moving

As the young girl and her grandfather loaded the disassembled dresser into the pickup truck, I looked outside from the door, realizing that people like me who are constantly on the move will never get attached to material things. There are people who hold on to things small and big, handed down over generations. Then there are people like me who could, in a month’s notice, nicely fit everything they care for into little boxes, put them in a car, and take off. I was not like that always. But I am like that now. I have moved so many times, that I do not feel attached to most material things anymore.

Two years ago this time, I had moved to a new home with a lot of excitement. I had designed and decorated, hung curtains, hammered shelves, picked up rugs, stuck travel magnets on the fridge, made multiple rounds to my favorite home decoration stores, and had scrubbed, cleaned, dusted, cooked and entertained with a lot of energy. I fell in love with the morning sunlight streaming through the glass doors in the living room.

But then, I have also had days, weeks, and months, when I was left without a place to call my own. I have lived in people’s homes, slept in their couches, and packed my life into little cardboard boxes, taking some of my life with me and giving away most.

Attachments with anything or anyone are but ephemeral, especially for foreigners like me who are constantly on the move. I changed six homes during my eight year stay in the US. I don’t just work in short-term contracts, but I also live life in short-term contracts. Whether it is good or bad, I do not know. But going through this exercise breaks the ego, breaks attachment, and frees you. It makes you buy things that you need, and not things that you want. It makes you appreciate the value of things more than the price of things. Look around you now and see how many things you will be able to let go. Despite being an avid magnet collector, I went up to the Rocky Mountains but never bought a magnet. What is the point? When I look around me, I don’t see many things I absolutely need. Sure, my passport and my degrees and the laptop. And nice little notes I have collected over the years, handwritten letters from friends, wedding invitations and birthday cards, little clothes of babies who are growing up and sending me more notes in their garbled handwritings telling me that they love me, tiny rocks I collected while hiking up the Alps, a little trinket from my trip to Paris, a handwritten recipe scribbled by my dad for days when I feel homesick. Try doing this exercise every year. Try letting go of things, possessions, and attachments every year. Try packing every year, even though you are not moving. You will feel very differently about life, and about people. Free. Uncluttered. Unfettered.

Empty rooms and bare walls echo louder. The house seems even bigger with all the furniture gone. I could easily be practicing football in the living room, or hosting a dance show. And philosophically speaking, when you finally leave, you take nothing with you. Sure you leave a trail of things behind, children and journal papers and bestseller books. But you take nothing, not your wallet, not car keys, not a family picture, not your hard earned degrees. Not even you. My adviser once told me, “We do not own things. We only borrow them in life for a little while. This idea of buying and owning things is an illusion.” I am sure that he has forgotten what he said, but I remember.

sunshine

2014

2014 was a remarkable year for me in many ways. It brought in many a heartbreaks, and boundless joy. This is an exercise for me to remember some of the significant things of the year.

January

First day of the year, I bid goodbye to Seattle after a wonderful holiday break. I land at the airport in the middle of a cold and wintry night. It had snowed the day before. In the process of driving back home on the freeway, I skid on black ice, not once, but twice. I am about to hit the side rails, driving at 50 mph on an 80 mph freeway, holding on to the steering for life, and waiting to be hit by any car, either from behind or head on. My life flashes by me in a few seconds. A miracle happens, and the car stops, barely a few inches from the guard rails. I am alive and unscathed, and have the presence of mind to not linger there, but quickly drive. My hands are shaking, I keep driving for the next 60 miles with my emergency lights on, and that was the longest night in my life. I come home and break down. I had a minor whiplash, and suffered from mental trauma. So much that it took me at least a month until I started feeling normal while driving again. I take the next day off to recover, but have to eventually go to work. For many weeks after that, something strange happened to me, and I stopped piling up food in the fridge. I started buying only as much as I would need for the next two days. For some reason, I could still not accept that I was alive, and stopped buying things, in case something drastic happens again.

February

February is a blur. The only thing I remember is driving to attend Saraswati Puja. This time, I was extra careful, and drove only during the daylight. Winter is at its peak, and every day is a misery. The Midwest sees a record of low temperature. I pray to God everyday that I don’t have to see another winter in Nebraska. In the midst of everything, I win a dissertation award, chosen among the top three finalists in my field. 

March

The beginning of March was the Academy Award ceremony. We watched it at a colleague’s place, who had cooked up a storm. Winter is kind of about to end, although it is still very cold. The ides of March, I learn that my contract will not renew next year. The job hunting starts. End of March, friends visit me from Seattle and Boston. It is the first time someone visits me in Nebraska. I had left hope that anyone would be even remotely interested in seeing this place. I was wrong. The last day of March, I have a conference presentation in Pittsburgh.

April

Beginning of April, I am away for conferences. After the one in Pittsburgh, I take a break at Washington DC for a few days, and meet up old friends. The train ride from Pittsburgh to Washington DC turns out to be quite inexpensive and relaxing. I visit the World Bank, and get very inspired about working there. I next go to Philadelphia for another conference and meet up with more friends. I realize that I have more friends in all the corners of the US than I have had in any other country. I am visiting Philadelphia after 6 years, and miss some of my old friends who used to live there. The weather starts to get better in Nebraska by mid-April. I discover a fantastic sushi place, and start frequenting there for the happy hours. The job hunt is still on.

May

I start going to these Friday art walks (held in many cities on the first Friday of every month), and start enjoying the experience. The job hunt is still on. I have applied to a bunch of places in the US, more than I can keep track of. But nothing seems to be working out. I am still hopeful, my visa does not expire until the end of August. Memorial Day, another friend from Idaho visits me. I am amazed at how many people are starting to visit me. The weather is much better now, leaning towards the hotter, humid side. I would prefer that any day over the cold and snow. I start driving more, and exploring the nearby lakes and forests. My friend and I are supposed to explore the Badlands National Park and Mount Rushmore. An hour into our 10-hour long road trip, my car breaks down for the first time. I have no clue what’s happening. We call the hotels and cancel our reservation, and spend the next 3 days at home, waiting for the car to be fixed. My friend is pretty cool about it, but I keep getting restless. This is the first time in many years that it is a holiday and I am not traveling.

In the meantime, I am still looking for a job, and now start talking to Indian friends who got a PhD from the US and then moved elsewhere. A particular friend who moved to Israel asks me to explore the options there. I am not terribly excited about Israel, I am still hoping that something works out in the US. I cast a wider net and start contacting faculty all over the country. In the meantime, I identify a good program in Israel, and contact the head. He asks me if I am willing to learn Hebrew. I say yes. Something in me is utterly lost and disappointed. He asks me to contact him in a few months, but in the meantime, contact a renowned research institution in Germany. This raises my hopes. I had loved Europe from my visits before. I contact the organization in Germany. End of May, I contact them. I hear back within a day, telling me that there is no available position. The next day, the head writes me back, asking if I would be willing to visit for 4 months. I miss going to my PhD graduation ceremony. 

June

I decide to go to Colorado for the first time, to meet my friend from college. I take the Amtrak to Denver (an amazing overnight train ride, cheaper and way comfortable than driving).  I meet my friend after 12 years and relive old memories. We drive down to the Rocky Mountain National Park, and other places like Vail. In the meantime, I hear back from at least 6 places I had previously applied to, asking if I am available to interview. I am on top of the world. I know that something is going to work out now. I had applied to two positions in Colorado alone. After my trip, I now start to hope that the job in Colorado works out. The rest of the month is spent interviewing with these places, and waiting. In the meantime, Germany has decided to offer me a position for a year (as opposed to four months), and now wait for my answer.

July

The positions I applied to are either not contacting me, or asking me for more time. I set a deadline of July 15, and decide not to prolong Germany. More friends visit me from Seattle for the July 4^th weekend. This is the third set of friends visiting me. Germany won the world cup football. And I decided to move.

August

August mostly involved packing, moving, and numerous trips to Goodwill. There was some confusion with the date of my moving out, as a result of which, I had to pack and move out on one evening’s notice. Although I was preparing for it for a while now, it was sudden. I hardly got time to mourn my move. By the first day of August, I had moved in with a friend. He sponsored a wonderful farewell dinner for me at a very nice local restaurant, where I had duck for the first time. I started for my first solo road trip in the first week of August. For the next 25 days, I was on the road, travelling 8,000 miles across 22 states. My three-week long criss-cross country solo road trip ended in Seattle. It started in the middle of the country (Lincoln, Nebraska), going south (Houston, Texas), north (Chicago, Illinois), east (Washington DC) and west (Seattle, Washington). The distance I drove was the distance between Washington DC and India, via Europe. I met 42 old friends in the process, and made 9 new friends. In this process, I also got a renewed Indian passport and a new German visa. There were no speeding tickets.

September

September 5^th, I sold my car. I lived for a month in Seattle, meeting old and new people, hiking Rainier and other places in Washington, and enjoying my last Durga Puja in Seattle.

October

I moveto Germany. I make my first friend there, a South Korean friend. I discover the only Starbucks in the city. I start enjoying the habit of watching huge cruise ships on a daily basis.

November

I make my second friend there. Also South Korean. I get my residence and work permit. I am slowly developing roots in Germany.

December

I visit my first Christmas Market (Weihnachtsmarkt) in Germany. I have my first Glühwein (glow wine or mulled wine). I submit my first grant. I visit Calcutta.

sunshine

Clueless in Seattle

I am in Seattle this entire September. It is not even Christmas break or April Fools’ Day. The last time I was here this long was in 2010, right before I was moving to Virginia to start a PhD. This time however, I did not take a flight to Seattle. I drove, all the way from Nebraska. Actually I did not drive directly to Seattle either. I took a rather circuitous route. I first went south, to Houston. Then I went north, to Chicago. Then I drove east, to Washington DC. From there, I drove west, to Seattle. I still think that I am reasonably sane. I just wanted to drive all four directions. Alone, in my car. And I did that. Three weeks and 8,000 miles later, I reached Seattle. I met many friends on my way, 42 to be exact. I made 10 new friends as well. For years, I have seen people do cross-country road trips, creating their trajectories using Google maps, and posting them on Facebook. Someone once did a smiley trip, driving from Boston, dipping down to Texas, and going up to Seattle, drawing a smiley on the US map. Then someone drove four corners, from Maine to Florida, to southern California and Seattle. There is no dearth of crazy people. I think I have finally enrolled my name in that list too. It takes you 8,000 miles to drive from Washington DC to India, via Europe. That is how far I went.

I had a lot of realizations in this road trip. It is only natural, when you are on your own, sitting for hours inside a car, doing nothing but driving. The music keeps you distracted initially, and so do the landscapes. But there is only so much music you can hear and so much scenery you can see. When you have had your fill, you go back to thinking. About life, about people, about the sky and the ground, and everything in between. About the past and the future, and everything in between as well. So I thought about a lot of things. And realized that I have nothing much to show in life. Certainly not if I held out my social checklist and pen, trying to check boxes.

Of all the 42 odd friends I met, I found a pattern. The people who were graduate students, doing their PhD four years ago now definitely have a well-paying job and a wife, a car, if not a home. And the people who had a job and a wife and an apartment then now have a house, a few kids and a pregnant wife, a BMW or an SUV, and a permanent residence in the US. The F1s have moved to H1Bs, the H1Bs have changed to green cards. The sedans have become SUVs. The rented apartments have become self-owned houses. The singles are all parents now, single or not. People have progressed, and have much to show from this checklist of achievements. They have run marathons, taken the ice bucket challenge, climbed Mount Rainier, created their own photography website, and have at least visited Alaska, if not South America. And all I have to show is a PhD. An effing PhD on a topic no one cares about; not enough to help me get a faculty position anyway.

I know that I had never signed up for a traditional life by any standard. Predictability bored me. When people went one way, I wanted to go another way. In the mid-twenties, when my friends were preparing to get married, I was preparing to move to the US. Later when more friends were getting married, I was busy changing jobs, running analyses for my PhD, or traveling. When people were raising babies, I was taking salsa classes, performing in plays, and dancing on stage. And now that those friends are about to celebrate their tenth wedding anniversary, I am pretty much still where I started from. And this makes me realize that I have nothing much to show in life, except for hundreds of travel magnets and hundreds of friends I have collected over the years.

Do I regret it? No. Is it freaking me out? Maybe a little bit. Given a choice, would I live their lives? I don’t think so. For better or for worse, my journey has been my own, and I own it. But once in a while, I pause and wonder, is this what I wanted? Of course the constant Facebook updates of people living wonderful lives and eating gourmet food has a lot to do with this. At 33, I didn’t think that I would have no job stability, no stable source of income, no savings, no one to call a spouse or a partner or a sugar daddy, and would be so lost and clueless about where I am headed. I didn’t know that I would be living my life in one year contracts, changing jobs and going to new places every year. Who would I be, given a choice? Well, I would be a professor in Seattle, working at UW or Seattle U. Or I would be working for the UN, the WHO, or the World Bank. I would like to live in a little condo overlooking the bay, and Mount Rainier, sharing my life and living space with Mr. Pi (a mathematician and a fictional character in my head). Mr. Pi is also a professor in rocket sciences, a field that not many of us understand. I write academic papers in the day and fictional stories at night. We go hiking, biking, and sometimes indulge in late night desserts at Dilettante, or take a stroll by the Alki beach, marveling at the Seattle skyline.

But I don’t see myself anywhere close to these fictional dreams. Instead, there has been a little bit of a situation. You see, my life has been caught up in an intricate web of uncertainties. I thought that as people grow older, they become more stable, accomplished, and sure of themselves. But now I know that sometimes, people get lost, unable to find their way out. They see their friends zoom by them, and wonder what they could have done differently in life. So now, I suddenly find myself a little lost, with my close friends telling me, "I told you so." Not too long ago, when I was finishing my PhD, I thought that I would next be a professor at an American university. But none of that happened. I moved to Nebraska, spending the worst one year of my life in America. Three days ago, I sold my car, something that I was very deeply attached to. Tomorrow, I will complete my eight years of stay in the US. And in less than one month, I will start the next chapter of my life, in a new country, in fact, a new continent. 

I am moving to Europe.

sunshine

Nothing to lose

There are times in life when you take in a lot of garbage. And then comes a day when nothing really happens, but a small something tips you over. You realize that you have had it, and you are done taking in all the garbage. I think I reached that point recently.

It happened the same day I wrote my earlier post. I was walking back to my office, and the wind was strong. It was raining as well, and thankfully, I had my umbrella with me. I have very fond memories of this umbrella because I bought it on a rainy day during my trip to Europe. So it is a souvenir. Anyway. The wind was strong (Nebraska is infamous for that), and my umbrella kept turning the wrong way. There was no point in carrying it if I was getting wet anyway. So I tried to close it.

At that point, my finger got stuck in the umbrella, tearing a little bit of flesh and drawing a few drops of blood. I find the sight of blood very repulsive, and as I looked at my finger in horror, something in me flipped. Tears started rolling down my cheeks, mingling with the rain, as a bunch of school kids on an educational excursion walked by me. These were not tears of sadness or fear, these were tears of anger pent up for a while. The umbrella incident was totally random, but it invoked a strong sense of anger in me, because it was symbolic of the helpless situation I was in. And I realized, I don’t want to be helpless anymore. I don’t want to feel like a victim, because I have not done anything that should make me feel like a victim. I am done being in this toxic situation that I am in.

And suddenly, in my head, I heard my own voice. Screw you job! Screw you visa! Screw you insecurity. I don’t have to take this. I don’t have to live in a country where I am perennially afraid of the insecurities. I don’t want a colleague suggesting me ever again, even jokingly, that I should have tried hooking up with a citizen, like many people wanting to stay here do. I am done. I am so done with this life. It is no better than being made to feel like an outcast, being asked to sit separately, like the British did to the Indians pre-independence, or higher caste people did to lower caste people.

The epiphany of “screw you” perhaps came from self-worth, and gave me more strength than anything had given me in the last few months. I have a PhD (I am told that less than 1% people have a PhD, but in America or around the world, I do not know). I am in good health. I can speak in English. I can learn. I can relocate anywhere in the world. I can do math. I can think. I have the energy. I have the courage and determination to do what it takes. I can take risks. Most importantly, I am alive. Why am I forgetting all my blessings? Why am I constantly trying to fit in? When I moved to the US eight years ago, I had nothing. And I had nothing to lose. But now, what do I lose if I don’t find a job? Absolutely nothing. I just go somewhere else, and take my skills and ideas with me. I haven’t spent a single day for the last few years when I have not worried about a visa. No self-respecting academic should ever fear that. Because wherever I go next, I take my brains, and my ideas with me. I realized that a high school dropout is perhaps more fearless than I am, armed with fancy degrees and all.

This realization gave me a lot of strength. Often under duress, we tend to think that we are helpless. We are not. This will be my chance to reinvent myself, create my future, and start a new chapter in life. I am looking for a job, but I already have enough work to sustain me for a while. Then what am I so scared of?

When I get a job, this post will be shelved as one of those inspiring notes written during crisis. If I do not, these will become words that will dissipate into nothingness. In either case, I will have nothing to lose. And that thought that I have nothing to lose is empowering in itself.

sunshine