Killing time in Newark airport

Disclaimer: If you have anything else to do, just go ahead and do it. Reading this is going to be waste of time.

If you are here, it means you are ready to waste your next 10mins... Vithi yaara vittuthu. Padeenga.

I wrote the following stuff when I was on my way back to India after an year long stay in San Antonio. I wrote this when I was waiting in Newark to catch my next flight to Mumbai. Date: 11th March 2006.

It is around 6:00pm, eastern time and I am now in Newark Airport, on my way back to India for a short Vacation of 4 weeks. The flight is going to be at 9:00pm or so. I somehow have to kill the next 3hrs. Since I am all alone, my thoughts are going back to how I spent the past one year in US. This trip is a great trip as I have learnt a lot. I would say, all these experiences groomed me as the person I am now.

But above all, I think I am really lucky for one great reason, 'The friends with whom I stayed in San Antonio'. I have spend all my happy/sad moments with them. They were always available to me whenever I needed them. I intend to write about why I feel I am lucky.

When I started from India, it was Gopi who accompanied me. Gopi is a practical guy, who doesn't get very emotional. The thing that I liked about Gopi is the fact that he is a cool person, never get very tensed for matters for which it is not worth getting tensed. He will keep himself cool and try to do what is required at that moment. This is one best thing that I and for that matter many people like in Gopi.

It is very simple for Gopi to make new friends, as the way he talks attracts everyone to him. Even to an entirely alien, he will talk as if he knew them for a long time. This is one thing that Karthik (my very best friend) had and that is also a major reason why i started liking Gopi. We both started to US on the same flight and stayed together in the same apartments and even shared the same room. Being roommates, we had spoken a lot to and about each other. But there were certain things that Gopi never shared with me in detail and neither did I asked him. Same applies to me as well. There are somethings in life which cannot be shared with everyone or rather need not be shared. Okay, let me leave this here and get back to what I actually want to say. I am just wondering if I actually want to say something here.

We initially stayed in a temporary apartment for couple of weeks and then moved in with Shaik. After Shaik left to India, we started staying with Jinu and Ashok. We both together bought Shaik's car and on explicit consensus, we both made a lot of decisions. We both worked as Business Analyst, but we both were more interested to take up a technical role. We both fought and got a break from our Business Analyst roles. We both did SCJP together. To consolidate, we both supported each other so well in all the situations. Or, I would say, Gopi was always supporting me. Whenever I needed some help from him, I always went to him and he always did whatever is possible from his side (as he always does for everyone). We visited places together and cherished moments.

Don't think that I am coming to say that I will miss Gopi for the next one month. Definitely not. Because, I know I am going to come back in another month and stay with him, as long as either me or Gopi go back to India for-good or till one of us get married.

Okay, coming to other roomies of mine, Jinu is a person of a kind. Whenever I wanted to go out to some place, he, even if he has something else to do, will accompany me. This is not just once, but whenever there is nobody else, there was always Jinu. Above all, I cannot resist mentioning about all the 'Peas Masalas' he made for me.

Ashok is real fun. He always kept us laughing either by the way he talks or by the way he acts. Ashok was always the center of focus in all our friday night dinners. All the travel from home to restaurants on friday nights were filled with fun, as we pass on comments about Ashok. If anyone else was there in Ashok's place, all those would have turned out to be a quarell or even fight.

Ooops, I forgot to mention about one thing. All three of my roomies are all non-veg people and I am the only veggie in the room. So, whenever they cooked non-veg, they always cooked some vegetarian dish for me. I would say that this happened on an average of twice in a week. Making two items is little difficult, given the time we start cooking. But still I have never faced a situation when i had to cook or had to go out to some place for my food. Believe me, it never happened in this one year. This itself makes me feel that I am so lucky. For all their effort, I never thanked any of them. Because they never expected one and above all, that never occurred to me.

We planned many trips and went. My roomies made many plans and included me in all of them, sometimes they dropped plans because i wasn't joining them, sometimes they changed plans because I need to fit in. It was great being with them, watching movies, going to bowling (games is one more thing in my life, which i don't pay much interest), having Friday night dinner, arguing about Business/Technical roles, arguing about anything, fighting, pretending to clean (actual cleaning is mostly done by them), sometimes cleaning too, watching cricket, roaming with other friends, going to San Marcos or other shopping, going out for regular grocery purchasing and what not. Every day is fun, every minute is happiness, every week went as if a week has just few hours, every month went as if there is nothing else in this world except for making us laugh and now one full year is over.

I look back at the way we celebrated each birthday. The songs that were played in my birthday and simultaneously happened mock wedding, the songs that Gopi sang on his b'day, when we kept on calling him from Ashok's mobile, but stored Ashok's number in a girl's name in Gopi's mobile, the silent music played by Jinu in a real Acoustic Guitar and the way Ashok cut the cakes. It was Ashok's plan in many of these Birthday celebration. Those were really appreciated by all of them who attended these birthdays. Wow, those were great moments in all.

This trip all in all is a great trip for me. I feel so lucky to have good people as my room mates.

After this year long stay in San Antonio, I am going back to India to meet my parents, relatives and my friends there. Will surely have a great time there.

Here, I tried personifying my self like Cheran in 'Autograph' and wrote this stuff. I know I did not clearly say anything and neither I did conclude anything in this writeup. I want to mention one thing that I am currently in half sleep, because I did not sleep properly last night.

Thanks for all your scolding.
Expecting even more from you,

-Sara