Before I begin, I have a confession to make. There have been only two occassions in which I have written a blog. The first time- I was superbored at my job and wanted to bitch about the situation and the world wide web provided a seamless outlet (I won't mention which job and if you meet me, please don't ask me). If you have worked in offices of the nature that I have worked in- where "research" is carried out on the Internet 99.99% of the times, you will know what I mean by the seamless bit. If it is on the web, well, it is comepletely legit!
Well and the second time is now. When unemployment is gnawing at my brains and the writing bug is crawling up my arms- so I guess the world wide web is the best friend yet again. Between job aps and checking email constantly only to realise that the email was a job alert and not a job- I can be relieved about the fact that atleast in this case, there is no big boss tapping on my shoulder and asking about for that "report". Well, truth be told, the job situation isn't that bad. The neighbourhood pujari has told my mom that the planets are aligning in my favour and there are indications of fortuitous results at the end of this month. I hate to point out that this pretty much seems like Met forecasts that we get (baarish ke aasar nazar aa rahen hain types!). This also, by the way comes from a man who has given me two ugly jyotish waale ungoothis to wear (yes..the shimmery stone ones that are supposed to bring you love and luck..horrors!!) and those rings unfortunately done nothing to elevate my social life!
Hmmm..social life. Ok..so let us backtrack here a bit and go back to 2008 when I left a not so well paying job, packed 2 huge suitcases which essentially looked like steamer trunks and landed in Los Angeles one day-- all starry eyed and expecting to be blown away by a cool sea breeze and swaying palm trees. And at 25 when the only celebrity spottings that you have ever had are Raza Murad (yes..who is he?) and a really aging Akshay Kumar, then LA seems the place to be right? So amid teary farewells and jealous neighbourhood aunties who were finally rethinking their decision to make their children into engineers and not "filmwallahs"- I boarded the Kithhey Pacific and left for the fair lands where dreams apparently come true. Oh boy..and fair they were! In fact the land was so white, that I had to put my sun shades on. Don't get it? Well..white feet, white hair, white necks, white fingers, white writers, white talks. White..white and more white! Ok I have to be a little fair here. The problem was not really in LA. It was in Valencia - the burb of the burb where the school was. See when a school claims to be about 30 minutes away from downtown LA- you would think that you would pretty much be dancing in the thick of action right? Well, no! In America, your sense of space and time will have to be renegotiated because in 30 minutes you will have to cross freeways and god knows what other ways- well ways that could give the Great Barrier Reef a run for its money. And the buses ..oh the buses make the Delhi bluelines and DTCs seem like super sonic jets! But more on that later.. Bottom line- if you are coming anywhere on the West coast- get a CAR! Well, obviously no one told me that and as you might have guessed, the celebrity spotting didn't quite happen either. Brangelina didn't exactly wave at me. Ok fine. Michael Jackson died within a 20 mile radius of my house. But like I said , America forces you to rethink the whole concept of space. And anyway, I found out about MJ's death through facebook. Old Mc Luhan (aka guy who termed "global village") must be preening by now.
And well..there were other problems too. The biggest one being- no one really looked like me. It was a year later that my friend Prerna Chawla came from Mumbai and the idea for this blog germinated. Over greasy Chinese and Thai take out food (believe me..there is little difference between the two), we rued over everything- joblessness, lovelessness, angsty long distance relationships, CalArts theatre shows, overgrown eyebrows and moustaches, Delhi VS Mumbai debates, classes, how to make bhindi in 10 minutes, finding the Asian grocery store and eating samosa, falling sick and wondering if the insurance would take care of us- the list is endless.
If you have read this far, perhaps you are interested! So if you want to add some color to that barren landscape, join the discussion and share your stories- we won't discriminate against you- no matter what visa you are on-F1, J1, H1, N1, H1N1 (oops whatever happened to that virus??), H4- whatever labels these guys put on us..Desi Women can Talk on this blog. And spread this blog wherever the education industry has taken Desi women- UK , Europe (yes Australia and Canada- we will count you in as well..)
Wow..that was one hell of a long-assed introduction. Well..you know what. Here is another confession. I have been accused of being "boring" by some people from different quarters. So maybe this is a lame attempt to be funny and take a lighter view of things. And I think that is the most humbling thing about writing and making films- you are throwing yourself out to the winds. Needless to say, you will step on some toes and maybe mighty hard. But guess what- on this blog, we don't care. Because we watch out for our own toes.
Cheerios!
Travel Bee
