How USA embraced me??

It all started with courage, continued with passion and on the way met with Love… Sounds filmy, isn’t it?

A small town girl: - bold, talkative, loved by everyone, someone who had never before seen that so called outside world, someone who never stepped out of the city alone. The place where I come from, the future state of graduating in computers is seen as working professionals. The thought sounded interesting but needed lot of courage to execute. For the girl that I was; waking up by yourself, cooking your own food or taking your own decisions was a fantasy. But with all the passion to know how people really work in IT companies, I was able to convince my dad to let me go to see how it feels to work away from home, stay with unknown people, wear those professional clothes and talk work.

Dad agreed and said “You can work for one year and then you have to return”. Well, I’m still working from last 10 years… All these years I have learnt every day, grew up every minute, earned umpteen number of friends, enjoyed the colorful days as well felt the rainy days. When I look back this is not what Appu was; and how life has changed me for the good (that would take another couple of blogs :)) Let’s get back to the topic…

With all the hard and smart work, my scores and appreciations, my supervisor wanted me to work directly at client locations overseas. I denied the offer twice since nobody from my family wanted me to go that far and neither did I have the confidence to stay across the globe.

After moving to another company, my new manager dropped me an email and asked me to fill in the details for a visa application. I felt good that I never asked for visa but my manager still wants to initiate it for me. I thought, let me send the details. Visa process will anyways take a year and that’s a huge time to think, but time flew. A voice from the inner me kept telling to try this and assured that it will change everything. It certainly did. I had never travelled alone more than 200km. I had to build a lot of courage to make myself ready to travel alone, ready to stay away from friends and family, ready to face times when I have to eat alone or take care of my illness alone. Being one of the pampered children, it was a difficult decision but I also wanted to know how it felt to work overseas.

With the visa approval notice I went to my dad and told him “I want to go once and I will come back in six months”. He was fine and happy but he did said, “People who go to USA once, they never come back”. I did not mind his words since I knew for sure, if not in six months I will be back in a year.

Bags packed, homemade food packed, recipe book packed, but could not pack all my memories. One last look into my study, one last kiss to my teddy and then one last hug to my family on airport and I was all set to board and fly to a faraway land. With all the fear and bravery I stepped out of the plane just to see how USA embraced me with smile; a dear friend came to pick me at airport, a room was booked for me at a Punjabi aunty’s place where another friend was staying. Office looked different, a lot more professional, but I was working with the same team so things were easy since I already knew them.

Some days were good, some days were gloomy, some days made me feel happy, some days just made me feel unaccompanied and scary. With the thought of going back in sometime I was just enjoying every bit of it. Explored so many places on east and west coast of USA as if this was my last trip to this land :). I learned to do everything by myself. I was never before this brave staying alone in the dark nights, in the quiet streets, in the trains, or even on food table. I started liking this place and more than ever, the work culture here. The longing for family was there but somewhere I knew I would enjoy working in this environment better than anywhere. My darling nephew kept counting days, months of my return. But then there was a twist in the story….

Out of nothing, in the middle of ordinary day, an email popped up in my inbox from a dad sending his son’s profile for marriage. He got my information from a matrimonial website. I was able to stalk this guy on facebook with the information from the email. He looked simple, fair and savvy. I called my dad and told him about the email and he contacted his parents and then we took over. I was in Boston and he was in Bay area, a distance which can be closer with six hours of non-stop flight. After a week of imessages and little chitchat I flew in to California to meet him. A date every day for a week and I starting thinking positive about this person.

Biren got a plus 10 for his looks, I so desperately wanted a fair guy (just to have fair kids :P).. Another 10 for his bike, I strongly feel men who can ride a bike are stronger.. And then when I saw his car, it was a cool sedan, luxury brand, black color, sun roof, which made it lil clear that though he is a Gujju, he is not Chiku.. :P  I wanted someone who was more educated than me, which he was.. He knew cooking, which I was bad at (And he never cooked after our marriage :P).. He took stories of my bygone days with super broad mind..

Biren was a person who believed in spending few months of time together before coming to some decision. After going back to Boston we started talking more, trying to know each other, dig in more. I actually started liking him but he was still confused and that really annoyed me. Even after a month of chatting, he had his last question depending on which he would decide on going ahead. This made me little skeptical but now I just wanted to pass the test since being with him was like a desire to me and I just wanted to conquer his heart which I believed was already done. It felt like one last milestone was pending.

Obviously this smart girl aced her Like-Love exam and there started a new chapter in life. Everything just became beautiful, the shyness in eyes, the smile on the face, the feeling of love itself is so wonderful. Red was everywhere in dreams. The good night messages ended with smiles, then with love you and then kisses. And finally I got my Love. My Mr. Right in States, in a place which I never thought of visiting.

Within three months of our engagement announcement, we got married in India. But these 90 days were the most amazing, shocking, experimental days. He wanted our marriage celebrations to be simple and I wanted it to be as jazzy as it could be. I always dreamt about having a lavish marriage with 1000’s of eyes on us, dancing in every function, meals that would be remembered by all and decked up as if we were the celebrities. And scorpions are born to win. Our marriage was a five day festival :).. A lot happened in those 90 days and it would again need a different post to talk about the stupidity, the way we behave in our early relations and what can go wrong or right because of being judgmental..  Fortunately we passed the tests with flying colors :)

Getting released from my previous project I moved to California to stay with my hubby and feel the essence of having someone in life. I changed my career path but got a good project which is helping me to grow..

I think I would like to say thanks to States. I feared stepping onto you but you kept calling. With all the courage I made my mind to have my once in a lifetime opportunity to come to USA. The work culture and people made me more passionate about my work. And finally I met the love of my life on your land. Thanks for making me bold enough to face the world alone, meet an unknown guy and take a lifetime decision myself.

PS. Happy New Year to everyone. 2016 was full of fun.. Our Bollywood themed anniversary party, wonderful holi, amazing trip to India, back to back camping, celebrating Rakshabandhan, Ganpati, Diwali with a pomp, Sonu Nigam live concert, dancing classes and the stage performance, gambling in Vegas, Yahoo’s YEP, and finally a well planned trip to Florida.

PPS. We have my brother, his brother and loads of friends around in bay area which keeps us busy and happy. It’s fun to have so many people in your circle when you are far from your home. At times it feels like we are in our own mini India celebrating each and every moment :) As always I’m so grateful to everyone here for giving us the feeling that we have someone who cares :) And a little more love to our niece Tasha for loving us so much :)

PPPS. Watched an awesome Marathi TV series “Eka lagnachi dusri goshta” together with Biren. We could relate so much to it about life after marriage that I would recommend that to everyone. Watching Mahabharat, an Indian epic since both of us are not aware about the complete and exact story. We also completed our old beloved jungle book and couple of English series, out of which Game of thrones is my new favorite.

I wish I stay this happy always and enjoy the rhythm of life and so do you all… Keep nagging me so that I don’t stop writing… Loads of love… Muaaahhhhhh :)