It was so hard for me to imagine myself holding a passport with a US visa stamped on it. My head kept imagining a churlish officer smirking and telling me, “Sorry Ms. Manasa, but your Visa to the US is denied.”
I prayed and tortured my friends to pray for me. I renewed my one-way conversations with god after almost a year. I went over, again and again, in my head as to what questions they most probably will ask and tortured a friend of mine to tell me what all they asked him when he went for his interview.
I waited, like how Sidharth waited for his visa in the movie Ayutha Ezhuthu , in front of the American Consulate, looking above at the skies for some inspiration and sympathy. I wore my brand new fab india kurta and jeans for it just seemed right for the occasion. Okay great, I even started considering it an occasion!
When I finally trotted along the long corridor, completely terrified since I was doing it alone, I let go of all fear. The air conditioning inside is letting my tense muscles loosen a bit and I breathe. A little.
I am asked to sit in any seat I want and wait for my number to be called. I pick the last left corner seat since that queue directly goes to a cute Visa Officer who seems to be smiling and giving everyone the thumbs up.
Now I'm shaking my legs like I've got a fit. Not like that's anything new, but it's got a new vigor now. I'm considering all the worst case possibilities: I could throw up on the glass pane while he's interviewing me, or I could faint..! But anyway once she calls out my number, I head to the counter. He turns out to be quite nice and tells me after asking me a round of simple questions, “ Your visa is approved. You can collect it in a few days.”
The trip to the US seems like a definite reality now. My tickets are booked (Air india though, don't ask me why), my shopping going on on an everyday basis, and my happy hormones? They are bubbling up inside.
After days that felt like years, of shopping and waiting, I set off with Gauri to the land of Madonna and Abraham Lincoln. Of Martin Luther King and Obama. Of McDonalds and Walmart. Okay, you get the point right?
When the plane landed in the soil of the USA, I felt elated. At that moment, I knew. I was going to make this trip, my best ever. I was so glad to see my sister and Raj after so long. And Nandita!!! She is just too cute to be described by a single word.
I don't exactly recall the order of events and it doesn't even matter at this point..The places I saw was just amazing and enriched me a lot.
1) Smithsonian Museums: They are a class of their own. Even though I saw only a few of them, the feel of them tells me they are probably the best in the world. I went to the Natural History, Air and Space and American Art Museums. It gave me the feel of the extinct species, nice museum burgers and aeroplanes. I saw a beautiful 3 D movie about the Hubble satellite.
2) White House: Though it isn't like the most brilliant piece of architecture that's caught my eye, it is the whitest and coolest with the most amazing goose-bump producing sight since it has such a popular stories attached to it.
3) Tyson's Corner: This is just a mall. But we went there so many times! Thrice for shopping (Duh!) and once to catch a movie called Letters to Juliet, which was pretty nice actually. I ate form a huge popcorn tub with lots of butter and a coke to go with it =)
4) Niagra Falls: The scenic view was just mind blowing. NOTHING can beat that feeling. It is gigantic, fierce and refreshing to just be able to look at it. Once I went on the Maid of the Mist boat which went just under it's nose, I was so fascinated by it. The falls is just outright beautiful.
5) Potomac Mills: This is basically an outlet mall. Since the branded clothes are so expensive in the malls and private outlets, they are offered at factory price at this place. I got my first Banana Republic top form here =D
6) Hershey's chocolate factory: Phew this was one hell of a place! The chocolate making process was a revelation and I got to make my own chocolate bar with the ingredients of my choice and I designed the cover too! And to top it off I got a degree in Chocolate tasting!
7) New York City: When I reached there, it felt like I had landed in India. There were so many Indians around, walking, shopping, screaming into their iphones. It was just crazy. Also, New York is way more crowded and noisier than DC. Hari Anna came to pick us up and we headed to his quaint apartment in Queens. The first day, we didn't do much. We just looked around and shopped somewhere near his house. The next few days were hectic as we hit the streets, Fifth Avenue, Fashion street, and there was this nice bazaar kind of exhibition in the weekend which served many cuisines and offered a lot of variety for us shopaholics!We also saw the Empire State Building, Central Park, Times Square, Broadway, NBC studios and the Statue of Liberty. We ate out at an indo-chinese restaurant called Tangra which was really yummy and spicey. We also went to another relative's place for dinner and they had prepared a feast for us! On the whole, New York City is known for its gastronomic delights!
8) Union Station Mall: Oh this mall has a feel of the place it's attached to, the Union station which caters to trains and buses. It is more expensive and has a lesser variety compared to other shops we visited but it was fun anyway.
9) Lincoln Memorial: Lincoln's statue rests here on a chair, a HUGE one. Really nice statue and his speeches are carved on the walls. It's a nice place to go for a picnic because there is a fresh lawn and the famous lake connecting the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument.
10) Holocaust Museum: The holocaust museum was pretty depressing, but it enlightens one about the whole nazi propaganda and the stories of the victims. It has a very impressive exhibition of a boy called Daniel and his story. The whole exhibit is like a maze where we travel, with the help of Daniel's narrative, around a replica of his original house and how his life changes during the holocaust. The ghetto he is forced to stay in, the gas chambers, there are even pages of the original diary in which he wrote, on display.
11) Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum: This place was just full entertainment. We went crazy hugging Tom Cruise and posing with Obama! There were a truckoad of celebs for us to pose with and we took as many photos!
12) Newseum: This is a museum for news. It was like the perfect place for us journalists! We did a mock TV report. We were allowed to pick our story for the day, so we picked reporting from the moon. It was so awe-inspiring! We loved the video feed that came out, since we picked reporting from the moon!
13) Gravelly Point: Here, we were like just few feet away from flight landings near the Ronald Reagen National Airportt in D.C. The landings were REALLY loud and this gush of wind will just hit you when the flights are right above you.
14) George Town: This place is a small town for shopping! Aldo, The Body Shop, Banana Republic, Tommy Hilfiger, Urban Outfitters and lot more stores kept us busy 'window'- shopping. We had some toothsome cupcakes at Geargetown Cupcakes, which is this tiny picturesque bakery, which is also way too expensive! I guess old-world charm comes for a price these days!
15) Walmart: This probably what I have been waiting for all my life. Hahahaha! I mean it! It was heaven. I actually didn't cross my budget too while shopping here...because well.. It's Walmart! Everything was so cheap there, and it wasn't even lacking in quality. I got some things I've always wanted here so I'm a happy person!
16) Costco: Costco is way too phenomenal. This is the place you would have probably got your chocolates from your relatives who reside in the US. It offers all kinds of things in bulk; Chocolates, cookies, cheese, drinks, EVERYTHING. They even have these small counters at every few feet which give out samples of the huge items on sale. I tried Feta cheese something, caramel popcorn, blueberry yoghurt and some Starbucks coffee!
17) Jazz performance/Sculpture Garden: I went to the sculpture garden to meet a friend of mine where couple of jazz musicians were playing. It was really lively and the crowd was going crazy! It was flooded with families picknicking at the lawn and everyone was drinking wine! I was hardly able to see the sculptures that were on display due to the multitude of people standing there! I also went to this place called Fro Yo after the jazz performance, which is a self service eatery, where we take a cup and walk around the shop, scooping up as much yoghurt as we want into the cup. There were so many flavors to choose from! I just couldn't decide. So I picked them all! I tried every flavor there was and my cup was the heaviest!
18) Chinatown: This place was definitely not a town. It was just a couple of streets having very few chinese shops ( Not that America isn't covered with Made In China products but anyway!) We just walked to this place that said Chinatown, ate in Subway and window shopped in the chinese shops
I guess that's about it. I enjoyed myself like crazy in this land of freedom! I've got so used to taking the metro here that I feel I can't do without it! I just wish I find a good college here with an impressive journalism program that I could get into!
I hope to come here again real soon. But until then. I will miss the USA!
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