Howdy

Second mail from the series described in previous post:

That is probably the first thing you would learn in Texas. People here say Howdy instead of Hi. It is a short form for "How you doing ?".

Resuming from Houston airport, in the morning I was waiting to catch my Groundshuttle at 9:30am. However around 8:30am I met a senior (an Indian) in airport who was also waiting for the bus. We both agreed to rent a car to college instead of waiting for bus. Here in US you can rent a car cheaply & return it at convenient points. He drove & I navigated (using a map). As it was registration day, so I knew that I would not find Apoorv or Amrinder in their homes. The senior then helped me find a room to keep my luggage & dropped me inside the college.

That day & next few days were VERY busy. I had to clear so many formalities & get so many things done & at the same time try to meet various professors & depts for financial aid. Gradually however things became smooth & by the next weekend I had handled home, grocery, mobile, bank, I card, fees, bicycle & other issues.

LIVING
The apartment has two rooms, one each for both of us. Each room has a big wardrobe (a first for me) & a window. The apartment has central AC, a kitchen & bathroom & has carpeted floors. For laundry we have to walk to nearby apartments. By now, we have also bought a vacuum cleaner, iron & toaster. Usually we go on weekends for grocery & on alternate weekends for laundry. For now Abhinav does most of the cooking while I do most of the cleaning. :-) We soon plan to have internet in our homes as well. College is just 5mins walk away & the area is quite safe so that it is not a problem even if we return very late. During free time we go to a nearby church here where we can play table tennis & foosball. The locality is mostly Indian & they also play cricket here during weekends. I am yet to calculate but I guess the cost of living per person should be under 350$/month incl home, mobile, utilities & grocery.

COLLEGE
College is VERY VERY huge. The core campus area is over 5000 acres !! We have free buses running inside & outside campus frequently. They also go to nearby stores & imp areas. Thanx to this, till now I have not had to pay even a single cent for travel. Texas A&M has the strongest traditions & they take it very seriously. They call themselves Aggies, are mad about American football (which is actually played with hands), have a bitch (she-dog) called Madam Reveille for their mascot & have different signs & calls for different student years. Favourite colour is maroon & they hate orange which is the colour of nearby rival college (Texas Austin). The campus is very well maintained & beautiful (although not as much as NSIT). All the buildings here are well-equipped be it the academic departments or the sports centre. The sports centre here is probably bigger than the size of two stadiums & besides the building there are around seven different stadiums for football, soccer, baseball, swimming & other games. There are lots of cafeteria, libraries & games centres all around the campus most of which are open till midnight. Also there is a flag room here which is called the living room of university. There is no other way to describe it, it is just like a living room where students can study, sleep, talk, play piano or just hang around.

STUDIES
It has been a week since studies have started & till now it appears ok. There are about 15-25 students in a class & professors here are very open. Some of them even allow students to bring in food in class. I have taken courses from Imaging & VLSI areas. For now I have not got any professor to do reasearch under. I have got dept scholarship of 1000$ & half tuition fees. I have also got a job in Dining Services for 7$/hour, 20hours/week. In between I had enrolled in an experiment in which I had earned 40$ but that was just one-time. Although I have to take just 9hours of classes in a week but the studies that we will have to do outside the class is going to take most of our time. I have enrolled in few student organisations to keep myself involved in campus activities as well.

APART FROM STUDIES
Before the classes had started there were lots of parties & free-eatouts for students from different clubs & organisations. For many days we didnt have to make food at home because of these events. They give away free stuff like anything. By now I must have got 6-7 T-shirts, cowboy hat, bag, a bundle of staionery & sports items, maps n what not - all for free ! As I said during our free time we either go to church for playing or stay at home listening to songs. Recently we have started to go to sports centre of our college as well. Akka, we have started getting lots of free shopping coupons in our postbox as well.

I have made few trips to tourist spots inside college & a short trip on my bicycle to a nearby town called Bryan. Probably in next few weeks we will do more travelling. Oh I forgot there is a VERY HUGE cinema hall here inside campus where they have free movie screenings.

Probably just like all around US, even strangers here greet each other if they come across. Sometime the greetings get a bit too painful as even if in a hurry you have to go through the "Hello how are you, I am fine, thank you" rituals. I had won a free ticket to women soccer match (here the normal football is called soccer & is more popular amongst women). As i was telling about Aggie traditions, here they have a ceremony called Midnight Yell which as the name tells you is a midnight yell. For this seeemingly crazy event, thousands of students assemble in the football stadium & yell in support of their team. They also have Yell leaders who co-ordinate this. I have took some photos which I will email you.

I hope I have covered as much as practically possible in two mails. Ofcourse in reality there is much more happening here, but I will try to keep you posted. It is possible that in next few weeks I may not be able to come online as frequently as now as studies will slowly pick up pace.

USA Ahoy !

Having neglected my blog for too long, I decided that I would start off even if it means copying some of my emails. It is not that I do not have anything happening in my life. Actually there is so much happening that it becomes difficult to keep everyone posted. What I do to answer that is an interesting thing that could be the subject of another post!! So coming back to topic, I copy some of my emails as posts here.

Following was first of the two part email that I had sent to my near & dear ones. No, converse is not true, so if u did not get the email, it doesn't mean that you're not my near & dear one. It just means that I was saving some viewers for my blog.

Now that I am relatively settled here, I thought I would write a mail to
tell you what all has been happening here:

31st Aug : After taking off from New Delhi, I realised all of a sudden
that there was too much free time with me. So I utlitised it in part
with my plan of what to do after I land & in part with watching movies
in aeroplane. I must have watched atleast 7-8 movies but the one that I
remember most was Ratatouille. While flying over London I could watch
the London Eye which is a huge merry-go-round. In each flight I made
sure I talked a bit to the person flying with me (British, Nigerian &
American). At each airport that I landed I made sure I explored every
part of it.

The flight was mostly vacant till London but after that it was full.
Flight over Atlantic Ocean did not have much to see except the blue
ocean & white clouds. Infact we were at so much height, the ocean seemed
to be frozen in time. Due to passing time zones, this whole flight
appeared to be one long afternoon. It finally ended when i landed in New
York. It is by far the best airport that I have seen till to date. After
getting through formalities, I realised that my next flight had got
delayed. Therefore I had a light dinner in airport itself. That also
tested my dollar card for the first time. One interesting thing in NY
airport was a multi-religion chamber where people from different faith
could come & pray. It was just a silent room with place to keep your
shoes outside. By the time I reached Boston it was already around 11pm
(a total of 26hours flight !). I wasnt too drowsy as I was sleeping for
most of the time in my NY-Boston flight. Jijaji & Kunal had come to pick
me up.

01st Aug to 10thAug : Next 11 days were spent really great. I not only
learned a great deal about American life but also had fun along the way.
For most of the time I was there, a friend of Jijaji had also come with
his family, so it was like one big reunion. Perhaps because Mummy & Anna
had given me so much info about Nashua & US, I knew exactly what to
expect & on seeing the beautiful scenes in Nashua & NY during my flights
before, I felt familiar with them ! The home at Nashua is very very big
in comparison to the homes that we see in India & also quite beautiful.
It also had few birds around for me to start clicking my camera. But
perhaps the most fascinating part was to visit the shopping malls such
as Walmart, CircuitCity, BestBuy which were a treat to watch. Although
malls here look very boring from outside unlike the malls in Delhi, but
from inside they are similar. I also got to taste McD & other food
outlets here. We also went to a mini-golf course, driving range,
baseball practice court & an ice cream parlour which was fun.

Amidst all these, days just seemed to fly between visiting malls &
playing with Rohan. One thing that needs mention here is the search for
a 'laptop deal'. I am sure jijaji must be smiling as he reads this. Not
having decided on any laptop before, it took several days for me &
jijaji to finalise on one laptop & when we did, we realised we had
ordered at the wrong place. After a lot of phone calls made by me &
Jijaji, we finally managed to cancel our online order (which would have
taken too long to deliver) & purchase it from a BestBuy store. Last few
days were spent in packing, data transfer & last-moment shopping. Thanx
to Jijaji, Akka, Kunal & Rohan (whom I saw for the first time), I had a
really great time in Nashua NH.

10th Aug : The day of flight did not seem to be right with thunderstorms & hails
falling & when I saw my first flight getting delayed my premonition was
proved correct. Due to delay in my first flight, I missed my connecting
flight to Texas as a result of which I not only reached Texas around
11pm but I also missed my groundshuttle bus which would have taken me to
college area (1.5hrs drive from airport). Taxi was an expensive option &
I was not confident about rental car. So I had no choice but to stay the
whole night in airport. I shifted my baggage to an area where
receptionist could see me & slept while keeping my legs/arms over my
luggage. Lots of other people were also doing the same thing.

11th Aug onwards : To be continued... (I am sure I've bored you enough
already)