Little Sentences. Baby Steps.

The last time I went to the post office in Germany (they call it a postbank), the gentleman had almost barked at me, since I spoke no Deutsche. Of course why I was at the post office is a topic worth a brief rant. Germany does not believe in making your life easy by sending stuff through email, and this has been said to me by no other than the Germans themselves. I had to submit some medical bills for a doctor’s visit to my health insurance. What it meant was typing a cover letter, signing it by hand, and posting it, along with all the original receipts.

Anyway, this time at the post office, I was prepared, armed with my knowledge from Pimsleur, unit 1, chapter 1.

"Excuse me? I understand no German. Do you understand English?"

You have no idea how many times I chanted these lines in my head. My last time at Potsdam was bad. I had learned how to say simple sentences while ordering food, but when I went to the restaurant, I blanked out, and all that came out of my mouth were just keywords, "Hähnchen fleisch, essen, bitte, löffel" (Chicken, flesh, eat, please, spoon). My linguistic skills had made me want to die of shame.

But this time, I did not want to embarrass myself. During the 20 minute bus ride, I chanted these sentences like a mantra. At the post office, I went to the lady at the counter and said, albeit rotely,

"Entschuldigen Sie. Ich verstehe kien Deutsch. Verstehen Sie Englisch?"

I even said "Ainglisch", and not "English", because that is the German way of saying it. The lady smiled sweetly, and spoke to me for the rest of the time in perfect English. She did not bark or fumble or confuse me with her German-English (where the verbs are all messed up, and people ask me to "remember" them instead of "remind" them).

I need not have spoken in German at all. But the effort that went into making myself understood in the local language, and successfully so, made my day. Because on one hand, I design large-scale studies and analyze complex data for a living. But on the other hand, my language skills are no better than that of a two year old. On one hand, I write journal papers with little effort. On the other hand, I struggle to speak two lines in German.

I might be slow, but I am working hard. I am trying to fit in.

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Amtraking my way

This happened to be my longest train ride. Since I love being on the road, I took the 46-hour long train ride from Chicago to Seattle, via Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, and Washington. The highlight of the trip was passing through the picturesque Glacier National Park in Montana, and seeing the last rays of the sun fall on the snowy mountains.

The Empire Builder is Amtrak's busiest long-distance route, carrying more than 500,000 passengers every year (Wiki). There is no wi-fi in the train, so I had plenty of reading materials, writing materials, and music with me. There were power outlets though.

It was an amazing experience. It cost me roughly the same as a plane would ($140). But this was much better than taking the plane. Imagine getting seats as wide as you do in business class. And that too with broad footrests that you see in the LaZBoy recliners. And then, imagine not having anyone sit by you, so that you have two seats all to yourself. And an amazing view to look at, unlike just the clouds. And a lot of time to gaze out. 46 hours precisely, that would have taken you 3 hours on a plane. And everything, at the same price for a plane ride.

The restrooms were clean and decent. With my height, I could nicely get in a fetal position and lie diagonally using the two seats. I sleep really well with the undulating motions of a train, and I dozed off by 9 pm on both the nights. The food is quite pricey though, and I got my own food and water. It was a long journey, but it helped that I was not in a hurry.

It gave me a great chance to sample a portion of the country's landscape. Back in India, most of us thought that the US looks like Vegas, NYC, or SF, thanks to the movies. As I started traveling, I realized that this is not true. There are places like Nebraska and Wyoming that are very much the face of the US. My journey was quite flat in the first 30 hours. But then, as we entered the Glacier National Park, the pretty snow capped mountains started to appear. I even saw a really gorgeous sunset by the mountains. By the time I crossed Wenatchee and Leavenworth the next morning, it got even more pretty. There is a lounge car, where you can get amazing views (Just Google "Amtrak Lounge Car"). I managed to get some pictures too, but they were shaky.

Overall, I would highly recommend the Amtrak experience. All I did was sit back and think during most of my trip. I did not even read or write as much.

By the time the Amtrak entered the Puget Sound, I realized that I was staring out and grinning. Back in childhood, when we would return home from out month-long summer vacation, that is exactly how I would feel. Even before the train chugged in to the station, I would start identifying all the landmarks. This time too, I identified the Edmonds-Kingston ferry, the Golden Garden beach, and the Pier 70. I knew I was coming home. Seattle is home.

My fellow passenger was on an even longer ride, traveling on a train all the way from West Virginia. That's at least 16 hours extra, compared to my 46-hour long ride.

"It's beautiful, isn't it? It's my home", she said.

"Mine too", I replied.

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A Conference in Chicago- 6

This time in Chicago, I decided to skip the touristy things (because I already did them last August), and have a more local experience instead. I was staying in a beautiful neighborhood of Lincoln Park, resplendent with parks, walking trails, lakes, greenery, pubs, and restaurants. I started exploring one new restaurant every day, and walking a lot. The bus connectivity is great too, and entry to the Lincoln Park Zoo is free. Every day, I took a new street and continued to walk in a new direction. I did this for a week, and it felt like I had already lived there forever.

The other day, I stepped out to buy fruits and vegetables in a bid to eat healthy, and ended up discovering an Indian restaurant. People who know me well know my obsession with eating biryani. So instead of apples and bananas, I ended up having biryani that day.

The other highlight of my trip was meeting my PhD adviser. One of the brightest people I know, I am fortunate to have been mentored by him. It is interesting how our mentor-mentee relationship evolved over the last five years. Back then, I used to seek his permission, his approval for everything, and my biggest reason of worry was how to do well in a class exam. Five years later, I have realized that exams and grades do not matter, and I do not need his approval. I already have it.

He used to often tell me many useful things, one of which was that he is training me to be his colleague, his equal. I chatted with him for hours at the conference that day, and it was an invigorating, one-on-one discussion. I shared my new research ideas with him, and he did the same. Looks like a German-US collaboration might be on the cards. He promised to visit me in Deutschland soon.

On a different note, a hilarious thing happened at the conference. I was sitting in a room, waiting for the presentations to start. As I looked around, I saw someone I had been introduced to yesterday sitting behind me. I waved and smiled, and she smiled back, a little reluctantly. Ignoring the cue, I started making small talk. At some point, my eyes fell on her name tag, and to my horror, I realized that I was speaking with a stranger. But she did look like the person I met yesterday. And before you tag me borderline racist, let me assure you that it's not just the Asians I get confused about. Often, I get confused between Whites or Blacks who look alike.

Looks like this is not the only embarrassing faux pas moment I had at this conference.

I totally missed seeing an old acquaintance professor as we were crossing the road. It was not until he started calling out my name that I realized this. We crossed the road coming from opposite directions, and I looked at him and looked past him, lost in my thoughts. He was nice enough to stall me and spend a few minutes asking how I am and what I am doing now. It was all the more embarrassing because he is a really famous guy, and the dean of a school.

I met someone, and spent a good few minutes telling them how hard the German language is and how things do not make sense, until they told me that they are from Germany.

But this one takes the cake.

In Germany, when you are at a restaurant and need to use the restroom, you usually open a door that leads to a passage with another door, and then you see the Ladies room and the Gents room. Either that schema was stuck in my head, or I was plain unmindful. I went out for lunch with a colleague. When he rose to use the restroom, I followed him too. He took a left, and so did I. He opened the door. I was probably far enough that he did not notice me following him. I held the door and entered inside before it shut on my face. I never read the sign on the door. I should have. And I should have taken the right door, not the left. I was in the men’s restroom! Those few seconds turned out to be the longest seconds of my life.

Conference talks. Meeting my adviser. Procuring biryani. Taking long walks in unknown roads. Taking in the sights and smells of a vibrant city. Gazing at the turquoise waters of Lake Michigan. Meeting the only friend I have in Chicago, and spending the next 24 hours eating nothing but dozens of idlis and bowls of sambar she made for me. Running to catch a Metra train, with two minutes to go, Kajol in DDLJ style. Listening to live music at the hostel every night as I fell asleep. And conceptualizing two new research studies while listening to others presenting.

That is pretty much a summary of my 10-day long Chicago trip.

I headed to Seattle next, to spend a month working at the university there. And traveling some more.

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A Conference in Chicago- 5

"For the love of Biryani."- This chapter is surely going in my biography.

After my friend told me about a famous hole-in-the-wall biryani place, I could do little but think of how to get there. So this is roughly the sequence of events that happened that day.

11 am- The conference talk is really boring. I want to get out. I ask my adviser if he wants Indian food (he loves it). He has a lunch meeting. I check for bus directions to get to Devon Street.

11:20 am- I am on bus one. It takes me by the Lake Shore Drive. I get beautiful views of the turquoise aquamarine Lake Michigan.

11:50 am- Take bus 2.

12:15 pm- Still on bus 2. It takes a turn and gets on to the much acclaimed Devon Street (famous for Indian food in Chicago). Dozens of Punjabi aunties, patiala-style loosely fitting salwar kameez clad, get on the bus. Everyone is talking in Punjabi. It seems like a different world. More Punjabi aunties get on the bus at subsequent stops.

12:20 pm- Get off the bus. Walk 3 stops. See the restaurant. My stomach rumbles. My pilgrimage is over. I know that I am only a couple of minutes from attaining biryani-nirvana.

12:22 pm- Man at the restaurant tells me that the shop is being renovated, and I can only order take out. I see a sign nearby, "Parking at the rear. We deliver." I wonder if I am the only dirty mind who finds it funny.

12:24 pm- I ask for a menu. They give me one. I am thrilled to see that everything I want is $4.99. That's a steal. I order. I wait. I discover that they are open 24/7. I resolve to visit again before I leave Chicago.

12:25 pm- I watch scary-looking hefty men empty heavy sacks of wood, stones, marble chips, and construction materials into a large truck. There is an incredible amount of dust. I wonder how my biryani will magically emerge from the dust. I have no way of peeping inside. I wonder if I should also get a side order of digestive pills.

12:27 pm- I suddenly get startled to hear, "Rishi! Rishi! Jaashna. Jaashna." (Don't go Rishi). I look to find a typical Bengali looking man wearing Anil Kapoor's cap from 1942 A Love Story, trying to discipline two monkeys as he waits for his order of tandoori chicken. The boys run around and try peeping inside the construction site. I hear more of jaashna, korishna, douroshna, dhorishna. I am reverse-surprised. I have always heard Bengali parents in the US trying to train their children in Banglish (English spoken with a Bengali accent).

12: 40 pm- My order is here. I offer my credit card. They only take cash. I hunt in my purse, to find a few hundred Euros, and a US credit card and debit card. They point me to a certain Baba Bazaar where there is an ATM. The name has me in splits.

12:42 pm- I hunt down the Baba Bazaar ATM. While I try to get some cash, the annoying man at the counter tries to make conversation, asking me the same set of question every non-White US cab driver or Indian-origin man running grocery stores ask. Where are you from in India? Where do you live now? What visa are you in? Did you get full scholarship for school? I have tried tweaking these answers for my entertainment. Like once, I said that I am a domestic help from Kerala.

My card is denied twice in the meantime. Flummoxed, I realize that I am using my credit card. I insert my debit card. Baba Bazaar uncle still wants to know why I am in Chicago. I see that they will charge me a fee of $2.50. That's half the price of my Biryani. I decide to order two plates now.

12:45 pm- I am back. The guy offers me my food. I order some more. I wait. I ask the guy if he gave me spoons. He says yes.

1 pm- I walk 3 bus stops. I was hoping to eat at the restaurant, but now, it looks like I will have to sit on the last seat of the bus and sneakily eat a little while the driver isn't looking. As if on cue, my stomach growls again.

1:25 pm- I board the bus. I take the back seat. To my horror, I discover that the guy gave me no forks or spoons.

2pm- I am still on the bus. The smell of food is killing me. My food packet is hot, and it is scalding my thighs, slowly killing me. The plastic bag they gave me is really thin, and tearing apart. I hold on to my food for my dear life. I am also carrying a DSLR camera, 3 lenses, a passport, and a purse full of Euros and credit cards. But it is my food I hold on to the tightest.

2:15 pm- After 50 minutes of a bus ride in which the bus stopped at every stop, every corner, every post and pillar, I get off the bus.

2:25 pm- I walk to my hostel. I go to the kitchen and get some forks.

2:30 pm- I get in my room. I sit on the floor. I open my food. The gastronomic foreplay has lasted almost 3 hours now. I think of taking a picture. Then I say, "Screw it!" I take the first mouthful.

2:31 pm- My friend was right. It is one of the tastiest biryanis in the US. I attain gastronomic moksha.

3 pm- I am ready to take a nap. I think that I have earned it. Conferences can wait until tomorrow.

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A Conference in Chicago- 4

I met the most uxorious man at the conference. A wife's pride. Or a wife's nightmare, depending on which side of the crazy continuum you are in.

I thought that the man was presenting, until I realized that he was just setting up the computer for his wife. I didn't notice any visible signs of impairment in the wife though. And then, during the entire length of her talk, he held a point and shoot camera, recording her. In case you are wondering, I have never seen this at the conferences I attend. Sure, some people take a picture or two after the presentation (mostly Asians from abroad do that, understandably), and that's about it.

And this is not all. When the wife finished and someone in the audience asked a question, he pointed the camera at the audience. I did not ask her a single question, because I did not want a camera in my face, recording me. He continued doing that, until the baby woke up and started crying. Yeah, they brought in a few month old baby too. At that point, he had no option but to take the crying baby outside the conference room.

I am wondering if it's a new wife, a new camera, or a new experience of presenting at an international conference.

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A Conference in Chicago- 3

Conferences are like huge weddings. People have convened for a common purpose of course (of presenting their work), all very well-dressed and all, but everyone has their own side agenda going on.

For some, it is a reunion- Old buddies meet up, hug, hang out, have drinks and meals, discuss their research, catch up, and make such a lively crowd. They are usually the ones much older and well-settled in their careers, the associate professors and the full professors, or the ones with permanent positions. They are done with the arduous task of looking for a job or getting tenure. They are dressed less formally and hang out in larger groups.

For some, it is getting away from work, only to get some more work done. They usually sit at the corners with their laptops, poring over their data and typing furiously. They are like little isolated islands. They are the ones with approaching tenures or appraisals.

For some, it is about networking and job hunting- Finding employers and employees. They sit in smaller groups and talk more seriously. Usually, one person is older and more mature and talks the most, while the other one is much younger and looks in wide-eyed appreciation. They are usually found in smaller groups of twos and threes, the younger one dressed very formally. They are the postdocs and the ones still looking for next year's job.

For some, it is about finding collaborators. They talk more seriously, in groups of twos, moving their hands frantically. They say goodbyes with promises of sharing research proposals, attending one another's talks, and finding each other on LinkedIn. They are the ones about to start something totally new.

For some, it is all about their talk. They look visibly nervous, fixing their slides until the last moment. They don't understand that it is really informal, and people have come here to enjoy themselves, academically speaking. They are usually the younger graduate students.

I suspect that there is also a small group of people who have been set up, trying to find dates and mates (although that was not the primary intent). They are usually the ones making awkward conversation.

And for me, I am just happy to sit back and watch human behavior- how people talk and walk and dress, meet some old friends and colleagues, disappear for a couple of hours to get some work done, support close friends by going to their presentations, get a little nervous at my own presentation, and above all, just take in the sights and smells of a new city.

P.S.: Ever seen how everyone walks very fast at conferences? I have seldom seen anyone walking slowly or looking lost.

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A Conference in Chicago- 2

I love living in hostels. My first hostel stay was in 2009 (Hawaii). After that, I had some pretty interesting experiences in Paris, Portugal, Puerto Rico, and now Chicago. It is a wonderful way to be surrounded by action, and see a constant flux of faces from different parts of the world. And I absolutely love hopping onto a bunk bed and sleeping high above ground level. It reminds me of traveling in long-distance trains in India.

The following day, I had breakfast with a bunch of Europeans and Brazilians who are backpacking around the world. The interesting stories they shared abound. There is always a dude with the guitar, sitting by the porch in the evening and singing his heart out. And a bunch of nicely dressed people partying and drinking beer. Since I was jetlagged, I was falling asleep by 7 pm. So my first night in Chicago, I fell asleep listening to some live music right outside my room.

I'll prefer staying with strangers in a nice hostel any day to staying alone in a luxurious hotel.

An old man boarded the bus the next day with some difficulty. He wore a nice beret cap, formal clothes, and a walking stick. He walked slowly to find a seat. The nearest seat was occupied by a man, who was too busy browsing on his phone to look up. Grandpa took the opposite seat, behind the driver.

I was watching him from the back, awash with a sense of sadness. Why were old people left to walk alone and board public transit on the busy streets of Chicago? Why didn't he have company? Whenever I see old people, I wonder if my life will also look like this not too many decades down the line. A few stops later, the young man was still on his phone, too busy to look up.

As the bus left a particular stop, grandpa got up to get off at the next one. Suddenly, a cab pulled up from nowhere in front of the bus, and the driver had to brake hard. I am shuddering to write about it, reliving the memory again. Everyone lost their balance momentarily, and we heard a loud thud. Grandpa had fallen flat on the floor. The noise reverberated loudly, and it was so loud that my mouth went dry. I don't know what grandpa felt, but that noise made me dizzy. I know that thud from childhood, when my own grandpa had slipped in the bathroom, had a cerebral stroke, and never quite recovered after that. It was the first day of the year in 1990.

A bunch of men rushed to help grandpa up. His glasses were gone, cap had fallen, and he had that disoriented, helpless look on his face that would move you to tears. I held on to the rod tight, watching him as tears stung my eyes. It was no one but the cab driver's fault, but of all the people who could be hurt, grandpa got hurt. I kept wondering, why did his family leave him to navigate the busy streets alone. Old age looks so much like childhood. Just that in childhood, your parents and elders and the entire world is smitten by you. In old age, the parents are gone, and no one else cares.

"Are you alright, sir?", people asked him.

"I don't know. I guess that I will know the pain tonight", said grandpa in a painful voice. There were no visible signs of injury, but that fall was bad. The bus moved to a corner and stopped. Grandpa thought that his stop is here. He started to get up again. He was visibly embarrassed and confused.

The driver made an announcement. He said that he cannot let the old man leave like this, and he had to call the doctor. So it would take a while, and everybody is welcome to wait, or get on the next bus, and they would not have to pay bus fare again. Everyone nodded and understood and started to get off. Grandpa protested, saying that he was going to the church and he would be late and he felt alright. But the driver insisted that he could not let him go without making sure that grandpa was alright. Most people wished him well or touched his arm before getting off the bus and disappearing into the crowded streets of Downtown Chicago.

In less than 5 minutes, I had witnessed two thought provoking things. First, what the scary picture of old age looks like. Second, what good citizenship looks like. I don't know if the driver did it out of humanity, rules, or the fear of being sued, but he did the right thing. And hats off to grandpa, who still goes on with his life, attending the church and traveling in buses. And for me, it leaves me so much to reflect on. I might have a thousand things in life that are not perfect right now (okay, make that a hundred), but I am sound, physically and mentally, and do not have to depend on anyone. If I don't feel like driving or taking the bus, I can walk, jog, and sprint. I do not forget things easily, and am usually not ailing or in pain. But these are the perks of being my age. Things will only go downhill from here.

And thus, I spent my third jet lagged night being alert and awake, hoping that grandpa was sleeping soundly, and was not in pain.

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A Conference in Chicago- 1

Coming home

Six months after leaving the US, I went back to attend a conference last April. The familiarity of everything American dawned on me at the airport, even before I had left the German soil. I had traveled to four other countries in between, two Asian, and two European. However, none of them involved such an elaborate screening and security check process.

An airline official was ready with a long list of questions at the airport. Am I a terrorist? Am I carrying illegal substances with me? Have I received any unknown package from anyone at the airport? Instead of getting perturbed, I started to re-realize that I am indeed going to the US. I went through this for eight years, and something felt very familiar and strangely reassuring about it. 

There was a final point at the airport after I had checked in my bag and gone through security clearance. There was another security checkpoint near the gate. I was traveling with a German colleague, and interestingly, he was allowed to skip that last security check, while they asked me to go through security once more. They even patted me all over this time. I don’t even have to guess why the colleague was allowed to go and I was not.

It was an eight-hour long flight to EWR, followed by another shorter flight to ORD. Things were uneventful during the flight. As we took off, I looked below and strangely, did not feel even an iota of sadness about being away for 1.5 months. For a brief second, I wondered if I should feel anything at all, but let go. It is what it is, and emotions can rarely be forced.

The food was horrible, cold, and bland, the chicken rubbery, and the cutlery all plastic. I knew that I was definitely flying an American airline (On a different note, the best food I have had is while flying Emirates and Turkish Airlines. The last time I flew Turkish, they served an eggplant preparation. I have never tasted a better eggplant preparation before!).

Immigration at EWR was easy-peasy. The officer greeted me in German, and I told him that I understood no German. He checked my documents, asked me why I was here, and that was it. When I said that I used to live in the US, he even added, “Welcome back, and enjoy your stay.”

My next aim was to find a power socket. I suddenly realized that I needed no adaptor (I have to use the American to European adapter in Germany; my laptop is from the US). The power cord fit in perfectly. It was symbolic. It felt like I was back at a place where I fit in perfectly.

Being unlost in translation gave me a high. Suddenly, I could understand every announcement, every small talk people around me made, could navigate around machines and ATMs, and did not have to use the "Translate to English" features anymore. I needed to buy a ticket, and my credit card worked perfectly, not protesting a bit. After using cash for the last six months, I was back to swiping my credit card. These little things gave me a certain comfort that came from the familiarity of how to navigate around and get work done (for example, I have two medical bills in my bag right now, and I have no idea what they say, and if both of them say identical things. So I will wait until Monday to ask a colleague to translate all of that for me. I am of course back in Germany now).

Anyway, back to Chicago. I flagged a cab to take me to my hostel. I was so happy to hear fluent English that I start chatting up. Cab drivers make excellent people for conversation anyway, since they meet so many people on a daily basis. And this one sure was one of the most interesting ones. When not driving cabs, he spends his free time reading about the brain. And learning Deutsche at the nearby cultural center (I was too quick to ask, "Why on earth?"). He told me about the neocortex in the brain, neural network, why old people become forgetful, why people are afraid of studying science, and a bunch of other interesting theories of his. He was from Russia, and knew that New Delhi is the political capital, Mumbai the commercial capital, and Calcutta is the cultural capital of India. I was almost tempted to ask him to have dinner with me, so that I could continue to listen to him. Just listen to him speak interesting things in a language I understood. That is the extent to which I had missed hearing English.

Much later, while dropping dead out of exhaustion in my room did I realize that in my excitement to talk, I did not ask for a receipt. I never got reimbursed for that ride.

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Mind Your Language

I wrote this post a few weeks ago, during a 48-hour train ride from Chicago to Seattle, specifically while staring into the flatlands of North Dakota. The idea started from musing about my life, or what it looked like last year this time, and how a string of events led to starting a new chapter of life in Germany. When my contract was going to be over, and nothing else looked promising, I started looking for a job outside the US. In Israel. Brazil. India. Germany.

Israel asked me if I can learn Hebrew. Brazil never responded. India responded, but only a year later. And Germany offered me a job right away.

So seven months ago, I condensed my life into three suitcases and a carry-on bag, and moved to Germany. My US journey of eight years started and ended in Seattle.

Breakups are messy. They don’t end well. Mine did not either. I moved to Germany, and started a brand new chapter in life. But not before patiently listening to the enormous amount of gyaan that people had to offer for free. Gyaan, that brought tears in my eyes out of gratitude.

“Why don’t you move back to India? It’s high time you gave back to your country.”

“People like you have a misplaced sense of entitlement. This country doesn’t owe you a job.”

“Great. You can travel all over Europe now. Maybe I will come visit you.”

“Germany is just like the US. My cousin’s in-laws’ half-sister’s stepson moved there thirty-three years ago.”

And…

“Let me see if I can set you up with someone. Maybe you can come back that way.”

I mean, my entire life was crumbling in front of me, and here, people were talking about patriotism. Entitlement. Their own travel plans. And an anchor boyfriend.

Germany is a nice country. Buses run on time. Things make sense. Most days, you don’t fear getting mugged or killed on the streets. Before I left for Germany, some people told me that the Germans are very good in English. They also told me that learning German becomes easier when you speak English. I am sorry to report directly from Deutschland that these people are clueless about what they were talking. 

Let me tell you what German sounds like, if you are hearing it for the first time.

Awkkh.  Awkkh.  Awkkh.  Tschschshsch. Awkkh.  Awkkh.  Tschschshsch.

Pretty badass, right? My grandpa used to make that sound at eighty, when he got phlegm in the winter, and his lungs choked and refused to start. My car made that same sound in the Nebraskan winter, refusing to start every morning. I should have seen that as a sign.

Bad words

German has many bad words. Not that they are bad per se. It’s just my dirty mind that finds them funny. There is a book store, not so far from my place. It is called HugenDubel. And they just don’t stop at potty. They fart too. Big time. Einfart (entrance). Ausfart (exit). Gute fahrt (have a great trip). Uber Fahrt. Fahrt means a drive. And any idea how the Germans say goodbye? Tschuss! I went red with shame the first few months, every time people around me said it excitedly.

Long words

I often like to think that when the German language was birthing, there were no space bars. What resulted were long, really long words. I mean, how do you say a one-way street? One-way street, right? The Germans have only one word for a one-way street. Einbahnstrasse. And here is the name of a bus stop. Schauenburgerstrasse. And food I order- Hähnchenbrustfilet. It’s nothing fancy, just chicken breast filet in one-word. And my favorite is Science- it is Naturwissenschaft in German. Nothing stops at less than twenty letters.

Umlauts

I haven’t even told you about the umlauts. No, not the omelets. The double dots you see above the vowels. Next time, take a closer look at the Häagen-Dazs cover, okay? The idea is, when there are two dots above a vowel, it sounds somewhere between that vowel, and the next vowel. So A double dot or ä should sound midway between A and E. Mathematically speaking, that’s (A+E)/2? How do you even make the averages of sounds? Apparently, the Germans have figured it all.

As a result, I am often stopped mid-speech, to be corrected.

“Lubeck…”

“It’s Lübeck”

“Looo”

“Loooooouuu”

“ooouuu?”

“Pout like a duck. Like you are going to kiss.”

And I haven’t even started about how Y sometimes becomes J, and G becomes G as in God. So Geomar is now Ga-yo-mar, Biology is Biolo-gee, although German is not Garman. Gymnasium is gee-mnasium, and it means, high school! And you say Ya, but write Ja, write Julia, but say Yulia, and now the Cs in clinic, coffee, and October are all replaced by K. Oktoberfest, right? Yeah, everyone knows that!

The Germans are big about rules. So you can enroll in German classes, but you cannot be absent for more than two classes. When I told them that I will be in the US for six weeks, they looked at me really seriously. Not that they had to make an effort, they look extremely serious any given day. And they told me, “Come back next semester, when you feel more dedicated to the cause of learning Deutsche.”

And what about their English? Well, I am delighted to report that the Germans have their verbs all screwed up. So they cook coffee. They make sports (the only sport I know people make is, yeah, making love). Forms become formula. Someone wanted me to fill out a formula the other day. Advice becomes hint (They don’t give advice; they give hints, like I am solving a puzzle). They also ask me to remember them (which means remind them). And someone said, “My husband will come and catch me after work.” I wanted to add, red-handed?

So amid long words, potty words, all the farting and sucking, umlauts, the Js and Gs, their unwavering rules, and the German-genders, I have learnt nothing more than please and thank you and I am a woman and I am a pregnant woman. I picked up the last one when my officemate got pregnant. I cannot speak one functional sentence in German. But I tried.

You know how we say words like, “really”? I figured out the German word for “really”, just because people said it so often. I tried it too, just to fit in. When someone told me something in English, I said, “akkh sow”. They were not pleased. They gave me a dirty look and said, “Did you just say asshole?”

And who said everyone speaks English? Bus drivers don’t speak English. People at the grocery store don’t speak English. And when you ask them something and they don’t understand, they don’t apologize. They get angry. Real angry! They roll their eyes, and speak even louder and faster. I mean, on a normal day, German sounds like people are fighting, from the epiglottis. Imagine how it sounds when people get angry and frustrated.

I was once on a bus to Berlin. When the driver made a long announcement in Deutsche, I understood nothing of it, even though I have been diligently trying to learn German. So I turned to my neighbor, asking if he could translate it for me. He nodded, and repeated the entire message in German, speaking slower and shaking his hands some more, as if that will make me understand this time.

That day, something else happened too in the bus. I fell asleep while listening to an audio lesson, teaching me how to say basic German phrases. For 30 minutes, I listened to them teach me how to say- "Excuse me. Do you speak German? No, I do not speak German. Yes, only a little. Did you come from America? I am from Germany.", and so on.

When I woke up, we were waiting in an unknown city, just halfway through my long ride. I was starving, and this was my only chance to grab food. So I dashed out of the bus. I wanted to ask the driver how long we would halt, but as usual, I did not know how to ask, and he did not know how to reply. So I held out my hand, and he drew patterns in the air on my wrist watch to tell me how much time we have (I have started wearing a wrist watch here after more than a decade, so that people can show me the time for something happening, even if they cannot speak English).

I dashed out of the bus and landed in front of a kebab shack. However, I blanked out. I remembered nothing of what I had learnt less than an hour ago. Imagine one fine day you lose your communication skills, your ability to make coherent sentences. I panicked, and the harder I tried to remember, the more I could not remember.

In one last desperate attempt, I shouted the keywords I knew. Hähnchen (chicken). Fleisch (meat; the man heard "fish", and that added to the confusion). Essen (to eat). Bitte (please). The man must have finally understood, and later when he asked me what else he should put in my sandwich, I said yes to everything. When he forgot to give me a spoon, I said, Löffel (spoon), and he said, not Löffel, but Löffel. Looks like I said that the wrong way too.

I came back to the bus, only to realize how I had stripped a language off its dignity by shouting out keywords, and that too, incorrectly. If this was English, it would be the same as saying, "Chicken. Meat. Eat. Please. Spoon." instead of "I would like to order a chicken sandwich, and could you please give me a spoon too, thank you?" I was disappointed with myself. This was perhaps the most undignified way of saying something. But I am trying. I am failing and floundering, but I am trying. Maybe someday, I will say that perfect sentence in a perfect accent, umlauts and all, and someone will smile and acknowledge me and give me what I want. Maybe someday, I will learn to string these keywords to make beautiful sentences. Maybe someday, someone will compliment me on how good my German is.

So amid this constant linguistic struggle I face everyday, that has added even more to my sense of alienation, I am trying to find the hidden part of my voice box the German sounds come from. Seven months, and I have realized how much language plays an important role in our cultural and social sense of belonging. When I moved from India to the US, understanding the language wasn’t a problem. I just had to change my dickys to car trunks, rupee notes to bills, restaurant bills to checks, and the capsicums to bell peppers.

I am without a phone for the last seven months, because I have no one to call and talk to. Sure, I have a job where I need help daily to translate every email and website and every meeting where people speak nothing but German. I have a bank account, but it is all in German, and I have learnt from muscle memory what buttons to click on to check my account balance. The other day at the Chicago conference, someone told me that they just met a bunch of Germans, and I should go introduce myself. I ran as fast as I could, but in the opposite direction. For after seven months of all the cacophony that grated on my nerves, I knew that I would keel over and throw up if I had to hear one more word of it. I have been gladly making small talk with every cab driver, grocery store cashier, and hotel receptionist for the last few days in Chicago, just because it feels so comforting to hear English.

And with this, I have realized something else. That Germany will never be home.

Perhaps, the feeling of home has nothing to do with nationality and place of origin. My passport is Indian, my work-visa German, but my home address is not on my passport anymore. Because no matter where I live, it is Seattle, and the US, that will always be home. This is where I belong. This is where all the milestones in my life happened. This is where I built everything, and then saw most things go. My work identity, and even the research I do sitting in my German office, is still American.

But now, I am a visitor in my own home. Because after having two student visas and a work-visa, I now have a visitor visa to be able to enter my home. Ironically, the student visa was for five years, the work visa for three years, but this one that prohibits me to work and earn, the visa mommies and daddies use to visit their children in America, is for ten years. Other than actually being homeless, this must be the closest to what being homeless feels like.

sunshine

Loneliness of a different kind

Recently, during a closer introspection of life, I realized how lonely things have become. Although Seattle was in a different country and I was living away from family for the first time, there was no dearth of like-minded friends or interesting activities to pursue. I took writing courses, did salsa, acted in plays (or watched them), danced, and made friends from diverse backgrounds (professors, writers, software engineers, social activists, etc.). My social life during my PhD in Virginia was quite active too. Having two roommates who spoke two different languages made a big difference, and they brought in their own set of friends, food, and fun. Then, I had friends from other groups- Bengali friends, gym friends, department friends, and east coast friends. Due to the proximity of several big cities on the east coast, my social life was not restricted to Virginia. I would be attending Durga Puja events in NY/NJ, Diwali events in Washington DC, driving to the national parks and the beaches on the Atlantic, and there was hardly a dull moment. My car made a big difference in my life too, now that I was quite comfortable driving longer distances (sometimes as far as Rochester, Cincinnati, and Connecticut).

My social life took a kamikaze turn in Nebraska. Suddenly, my real-time friends were reduced to a list of names on Skype. I realized that as students, it is much easier to make new friends. As a postdoc at a new university, I no longer felt comfortable with the student crowd (although they tried, and I tried too). I no longer identified with their life issues (not being able to drive, not passing the qualifiers, not graduating on time). On the other hand, most of the postdocs had families, and I did not fit into that group either. I remember someone trying to introduce me to a group that met for satsang and bhajans and vegetarian meals, although that was really not my idea of socializing. I never went, and they never talked to me again.

Married people came with their own stories (being a trailing spouse, the child never eating or sleeping enough, the mortgage being too high, the car insurance too steep, and the immigration policies too unforgiving, group politics among the Bengalis, etc.). I attended some social events, but did not feel engaged enough. The faces were different, but the problems were all the same. Being in the middle of nowhere, Nebraska never allowed me enough opportunities to escape somewhere. The weather was extreme, the Colorado mountains too far, the beaches nowhere to be seen, and there was only so much one could drive in the middle of the cornfields. That was the first time I actually began to realize what loneliness is. I sometimes went to the local Bengali association, attending the pujas and Diwali amid a group I clearly did not fit into. I kept myself busy by taking pictures at these events, my way of contributing socially. It was not that there was a dearth of people I knew. It’s just that the sample size of “people like me” had significantly decreased.  

This brought in a very important realization. We are perhaps subconsciously programmed to hang out with people “like us” unless we make a deliberate attempt not to do so. Bengalis hang out with the Bengalis, married couples hang out with other married couples, and people in academia hang out with other people in academia. This is perhaps because it gives us a lot of common topics to talk about. I mean, what would an Indian postdoc talk to a Russian chef? Ever seen how totally incompatible adults hang out with one another, and gladly do so because they have children who are playmates? Thankfully, my diversions and hobbies kept me engaged. I read, watched foreign language films, wrote, took pictures, made travel plans, and so on. However, the loneliness persisted.

Things in Germany are far worse. Language and culture are huge barriers, but what creates a greater divide is my failure to hang out with the Indians here, just because we share a common cultural background, and perhaps nothing more. I felt much more comfortable with the few Americans I met in Germany. On the other hand, I made some good Korean friends. I had more in common with them, because they are single, researchers, people who have traveled the world, and provided me a first-hand perspective of an interesting life. We were experiencing a shared struggle of learning the German language, and getting used to the culture. In a way, we were all the same: foreigners. Whenever I needed company for a walk, or wanted to visit a local café, they were usually there. However, some of them are leaving, without promises of returning anytime soon.  

Things are perhaps not as unhappy as I am portraying. Most days, I am really happy reading a book while watching the ships, and not have anyone interrupt my thoughts. However, the human connection is definitely missing from my life now. There are still enough people I see on a regular basis. However, I don’t have much common with them anymore.

Recently, when an old school friend contacted me after many years, I was surprised that I felt a mixture of happiness and dread. For I knew that somewhere during the conversation, she would either bring up things like her kid not eating and sleeping and pooping enough, or ask me why I am not joining the bandwagon of married people. She would not talk about learning new statistical tools, trying something new on Coursera, or finding some cool solution to a scientific problem. However, I am still expected to be enthusiastic about keeping in touch, just because we were once together in the ninth and tenth grade (a time when we had everything in common).

You see, these people are not bad people, but just different people. Not diverse, but different. I now realize why people procreate (other than the usual reasons about human instincts and the urge to spread your genes). It keeps people busy with regular, organized activities centered around care-giving duties (cooking, cleaning, playing, teaching, socializing); sometimes even chores, but engaging activities nevertheless. Being the caregiver for two children, my mom was really busy at my age. She was sending us to school, supervising our homework, managing the home, caring for the in-laws, adjusting with my dad’s erratic work schedules, and being in charge of the family single-handedly. I, on the other hand, have no such roles to play. My major responsibilities include feeding myself, taking care of my health, making sure that I show up at work on time, meet deadlines, keep the house clean, and that’s about it. Sometimes, my biggest dilemma for the day is no, not how to educate my children better, but whether to wear a red shirt or a grey shirt at work. No one will be hungry or waiting for me at home if I am late. In fact no one will even know that I am late.  

Naturally, I dread my weekends. Work gives me a serious engagement, a sense of accomplishment, and an avenue of socializing (precisely why I don’t like working from home). But the weekends are hard. Sometimes when I come back to work on Mondays, I realize that I am croaking, because my vocal cords have gathered cobwebs over the weekend with no one to talk to. While people look forward to the weekends, thanking God that it’s Friday and what not, I really wonder how I will kill time. Because engagement requires planning, and planning requires energy and enthusiasm. So I take the easier way out, either watching back-to-back movies until my back hurts, or working some more. Sometimes, I try the selfish way out, by Skyping with my family to relieve me of my loneliness. However, they are even busier, and nowhere to be seen in the weekends. They are often traveling, attending weddings, socializing, trying out the food at new restaurants, catching up with the latest movies in the theaters, and doing a gazillion things on the weekend. Precisely the kind of life I would like to live in Germany.

A couple of realizations before I end this reflective post that turned out to be more of a rant. With age, my acquaintances have increased (800 friends on FB, and counting), but my friends have decreased. In my twenties, I hung out in big groups, engaging in planned activities and small talk. Now, I want to spend more individual time with a smaller group of people (the smaller, the better). I don’t want to make small talk in big groups, but big talks in small groups. Also, the people I identified with at some point (because they were school buddies or college mates), I no longer have anything in common with them. They have been replaced by a newer set of friends, definitely smaller in number (and getting smaller every year). A handful of close friends have passed, making me realize that death is no longer something that happens to the older people, people my parents or grandparents knew. Even people my age can die (and why not? I think that I am almost done with half my life).  Most importantly, I am realizing that it is so important to have a critical mass of friends you can meet on a regular basis at any given point of time. Because that is what helps the extroverts get more extroverted, and the introverts like me to be sufficiently engaged. Instead, that critical mass of friends is almost going to hit single digit numbers for me, as a result of which, the introvert in me is getting more introverted, retreating into a shell. They even have a cool term for this. It is called the Matthew effect.

The other interesting thought is understanding whether your interests earn you friends, or whether your friends earn you interests. I have done both in the past. For example, I have made friends because of my interests (acting in plays, dancing, learning music). However, I have also pursued new interests (like watching Thai horror movies or learning Korean) because of friends. I guess one way out of this ordeal would be to keep doing the things I love doing (joining a dance group, doing Zumba, traveling, and so on), and hoping that new friendships develop organically this way. Or maybe I should just move to Seattle. That is one place where I will never have to worry about not having enough friends, or not having enough things to do in the weekends.

P.S.: I shudder to think how much more I will be ranting in my fifties.

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Germinating- Part 3

I came here on a 12 month contract that was first a four month offer, and recently became a 15-month gig. This means that I should be applying for my next job. But I have decided not to. When I moved to Germany, a feeble voice inside me grew stronger. It is that inner voice that somehow gets drowned amid noise, external conditioning, and safety plans.

            Instead, I am spending my energies writing grants, asking for money so that I can design and implement my own projects here. The phase following a PhD is one of the most fertile phases, where you are getting new ideas, and are ready to do independent research. However, again and again, I find myself working for others, fulfilling other people’s dreams of tenure and success. Most people become professors a few years into completing their PhD. I am still looking for that position. So instead of waiting, I decided to already start my own research. It is a big risk in a way, and failing only means being unemployed, and going back to living, even though temporarily, with parents. However, taking this leap of faith is a big philosophical shift I am making. I want to stop chasing jobs, friends, relationships, and opportunities. Something feels dishonest about it. I just want to keep doing what I love doing, and allow things to develop organically. The message of the debit card and the advance salary was not lost on me. When my debit card did not work in Germany, I could have panicked and called the US, even asking friends to wire me money. It felt scary to be poor and hungry. For the first four days, I understood what being hungry felt like. I have never felt food insecurity in life. If anything, I ate more than I should. But for the first four nights, I had one boiled egg and one potato for dinner, with some salt and pepper powder G had the intuition to pack for me. Food has never felt tastier, and I hungrily lapped up the last morsel. And just when I was wondering how I will go hungry for the rest of the month, I got my salary in advance. So my plan is to stop micromanaging my life, and let go.

            During my second week, I had a rather terrifying experience at the grocery store. It overwhelmed me to see that everything, including the overhead aisle descriptions, were in German. There were things that I could see and identify (like fruits and vegetables), but it took me forever to find salt and sugar and oil. There were a dozen varieties of body lotions, and there was no way for me to figure out what to buy. When you see the picture of a mountain, with some strange German word written, it could contain anything- salt, cigarettes, or drugs. I realized that I did not even read anything while grocery shopping in the US. I instinctively knew that the blue box is Morton Salt and oil was in aisle number 5. I was later told that an app called Word Lens translates words. It is free, and you don’t even need an internet connection to use it. Five months, and I still feel disoriented in the grocery stores, especially while looking for something new. However, I am mostly navigating from memory and experience.

            During the first few months, people helped me with everything, from setting up auto rent pay to choosing health insurance plans, finding me staplers, schedule for gym classes, maps of the city, and even translating things for me. The tech support guy at work installed Microsoft Office in English, but the acrobat reader was in German. So I tried to work my way around, remembering things from muscle memory. It felt a little sad not having someone to celebrate a little milestone with, when I got my first salary in Euros. Europe is a good combination of the first world experiences of the US, while offering some of the comforts of the Indian way of living. Buses run on time, restrooms are clean, and the quality of research is quite good. People walk and bike more, eat together, and there is more of social bonding. I feel like a child once again, slowly learning new words, the German map, and the names and capitals of the German states.

            I love Germany, and miss the US at the same time. I was reflecting on why leaving a place is sometimes so painful, and getting used to a new place so overwhelming. Perhaps our senses get used to doing familiar things in a repetitive pattern.  However, my brain is slowly, but surely beginning to make associations and connections, like figuring out which bus to take to reach faster. The first few months, I feared getting lost on the streets, and never went anywhere beyond the seven bus stops from work to home. I mostly walked in straight lines, without taking turns, so that finding my way back was easier. Remembering a name like Madison Avenue is easy, but not a name like Samwerstraβe, which sounds very different from how it is spelled. I live by the water, so I always tried to remember where I was with respect to the water. My brain is mapping new visual imageries, directions, street names, and signs. It makes me realize that most of the things we do every day happens at the reflex level. When you need to take Exit 10 and you see the sign, you do not start counting from one to ten to see what ten sounds like. But now that I am learning numbers, it is not so easy for me to remember that drei means three and zehn means ten. So I start counting from one, somewhat in a rote fashion.  

            All this has taken me back to my experience of learning languages as a child. Remember how as children, first we learnt basic words? A for apple, B for boy. And there would be big colorful charts of fruits and vegetables hanging all around the walls in classrooms. Now I know why. The more you see them, the more you remember them through visual associations. That is why teachers made you repeat things hundred times a day. Ma said that I could recite Bengali poems verbatim as a kid, even before I understood the language. That is because I had memorized the phonetics. When you say pomegranate in English, I can instantly visualize it. But if you say Granatapfel, the visualization is not so easy. My effort to make sense of the German language has renewed my appreciation for the immense cognitive processing children are constantly doing, breaking down complex information into simpler one, and retrieving it again to make sense of the world.

            A colleague once asked what German sounds like, and I said, “akhh schw akhh schw”. When I did not know Tamil, it sounded like “andre pandre wangopongo”.  Once you know a language, you cannot undo the knowing. So I will never be able to tell what Bengali sounds like, because it is not possible for me to do that level of macroscopic deconstruction anymore. I am slowly learning some German key words, but learning the language will happen at two levels. One, identifying the words by reading them, and two, being able to say it the German way, and not the English way. I know danke (thank you) and tschus (good bye). I know zucker and salz (sugar and salt). At the mensa (cafeteria), I look for huhn or hähnchen (chicken), and eat using a löffel, gabel, and messer (spoon, fork, and knife). And einbahnstraße (one way street) is a pretty cool word (ein means one, bahn means vehicle, straße means road, the ß signs means double S). However, after all this German hearing every day, I cannot wait to come home and watch movies in English. Hearing American English feels like such a luxury now.

            I am slowly beginning to get used to the smaller spaces and things. The roads, cars, kitchen appliances, trash cans, and food portions that seemed so much smaller at first do not seem that small anymore. Every day, I am in awe of how beautiful this place is. Seasons are changing, the trees are shedding and sprouting leaves, and the water looks different every day. One day, I told myself that I could live here forever if the salary was better and the work contract longer. Then I checked myself, remembering that love for anything, people or places, happens not just “because of” something, but also “despite” other things. You cannot love a place one day if you start earning more or become famous there. We often confuse the cause and effect sequence. Love happens despite the limitations. I think living in different places makes us wiser, not just because we get to sightsee and learn more new things outside us. It also opens our eyes to who we are, what lies within us, and what we are capable of doing. Living here is making me more aware of myself- my strengths and weaknesses, how I respond to stressful situations, make sense of things, and how I use my instincts to navigate around. If I had never left Calcutta, I would have never known who I could be.  

            Despite everything promising, I still sometimes have bad days, when I do not sleep well, wake up disoriented, and miss everything my life in the last few years was. I still haven’t found an English library, and terribly miss reading and smelling books. After feeling like an Indian in the US all these years, I now feel like an American in Germany. The Nebraskan landscape had seriously deprived my visual senses of beauty. But for better or for worse, it was still a known country. Now, my life feels just like a huge blob of boundless, formless, and rootless energy. Being rootless can be empowering and exciting, but being rootless can also feel very scary.

            Bank accounts. Keys. Address, telephone number, and email. Campus card. Bus pass. I have slowly grown some roots here the last few months. I have stopped recreating my Indian life here by hanging out mostly with fellow Indians (something I always did in the US). There was nothing wrong with that, but it isolated me from the more local experiences. A young Indian man from the city recently contacted me on a social networking site, writing, “Hi, myself [name] this side” (It is an Indian-English way of saying that I am so and so from such and such place). And I smiled, telling myself that I am not taking sides anymore.

sunshine