United States of America is a country with almost
five times the area of India, the population being less than one-fifth of
India. USA is encircled by Pacific Ocean in the West, Atlantic Ocean
on the East , Canada on the North and Mexico and South America in
the South. In the South East in states like Florida, climatic
conditions are similar to what we have in Kerala , but
most of the Northern states are extremely cold for more than 8
months in a year. Alaska on the North extreme is close to
the Arctic region on South pole. Many states
are completely covered in snow for more than three months in a year.
USA has 50 states and Hawaiian Islands form the 50th state in
USA. USA being between two of
the oceans, the distance between two major cities New
York on the East and California on the West is nearly 4000 KMS .
Alaska, the Northern most state in USA was originally with Russia.
In 1867, Alaska was bought from Russia for seven million dollars which was a
reasonable prize at that time. However, the discovery of large
deposits of oil between Swanson River and Cook island has made
Alaska a financially critical state in USA.
Oil is carried in long pipelines to other parts of
the country, very few roads are available as these will be covered
by snow for most of the months in a year. Most of
the transport is by air.
Hawaii islands were given the status of a
state in 1959. Honolulu is the capital of Hawaii. Pine apple and
sugar are major exports from Hawaii. Even though the
biggest among the islands is Hawaii, more people live in the island Oahu.
Honolulu is in this island. The major
islands are Hawaii (the Big
Island), Maui, Oahu. Kauai. Molokai, Lanai, Niihau and Kahoolawe.
The shortest
route to Hawaii from
India is via Singapore and Japan . From Chennai, it takes 4 hours to reach
Singapore crossing the Indian ocean, then another 5 ½
hours to Norite airport in Japan along the Pacific coast and another
6 ½ hours on the Pacific to Honolulu. Since we
will be crossing the international date line, it is possible to
reach Hawaii on the same day as we start from India. This is an
advantage in travelling through the East to USA.
Before I started on my journey , I had
written an email to one of our old students in Japan (Sankar
Mananmpatamana) telling that I am passing through Japan.
He was a student with very strong interest in
our classical arts, especially in Kathakali
, Bharathanatyam etc. He replied that he will try to come and meet
me even though he will have to drive for three hours,
just to talk to me for a few minutes since I have a few
hours in transit. I had a
comfortable flight from Chennai to
Singapore by Air India and by North East Airways(
Later absorbed by Delta Airways) from
Singapore to Norite. But I could not reach the waiting
room at the airport to meet my dear student.
The problem was the language. I
was trying to tell the security personal in my
English that I want to see my student inside the airport
but he could not understand. I did not know a
single word in Japanese. I tried my best to
convince him to permit me to go out for ten minutes
but of no avail. I was
really sorry that if my dear student friend
has taken the effort to drive all the way to reach the airport and
wait for me in the airport lounge to meet this
teacher who has taken a few classes for him. Since this
was my first trip abroad, I had not known that a visa is
required to go outside the airport. Unfortunately, I did
not have even Sankar’s phone number with me. The standard of English
language among the people in the Far East is
very poor. Even if they try to speak in English, due to the strange accent,
it will be difficult for us to understand. I silently
begged to my student friend
to forgive me if he had come all the
way to the airport.
My flight to Honolulu was to take off only
after 5 hours. Fortunately, flight timings and
gate numbers were displayed in English also. I
thought I will take a coffee and snacks. But I was not
sure about the cost. First, I got some black coffee paying ten
American dollars and I got a few coins as change. Japanese coin Yen
exchange rate with USD was something like ten thousand or
so. I did not buy any snacks seeing the price of the coffee. Even
though I was hungry, I did not want to get my
pocket burnt and sat quietly thinking about the food that will be
served in the flight. Even that I was not very
confident to eat. We cannot get the type of non-veg
food in the flight in these areas. Most of the passengers
are served meat or sea food for dinner or lunch. As
per the advice from a senior colleague who has travelled widely, I
had asked for Asian vegetarian meals , otherwise I may
have to eat snake fry or half boiled fish on flight.
Finally, it was time to board the flight to
Honolulu. Identifying the boarding gate by seeing the display board,
I reached the correct gate and boarded the flight. This flight will take almost
6 hours to reach Honolulu, my next destination. Due to
the time difference ,it was not possible to sleep. There
was a tv screen in front of each seat
and I started playing chess on the screen first. Then I started
seeing an English movie titled Mrs.Doubtfire. The
story was about an Englishman who divorced his
wife and staying alone. As he still loved his wife and
children and wanted to live with them, disguised
as a maid servant he applies for a job in
their house and comes back to live with them. It is a
hilarious comedy where the actor Robert Williams gives a splendid
show. It seems the story line of the Tamil
movie Awayar Shanmughi by Kamal Hasan
is more or less taken from this movie. Still not able to sleep, I
started looking out. But what I could see was only clouds and
the blue colour of the majestic Pacific Ocean below,
nothing else .
Anyway, somehow half awake and half sleeping I
reached Honolulu airport. Now another problem, it is
America where nothing is free. For getting a
trolley for taking the luggage, a dollar coin has
to be inserted in the slot , then only
the trolley will be released. I had no coins with me as the bank
gives only dollar notes. While I was
struggling to get a trolley released without inserting a
coin, a fellow passenger
volunteered to put a coin and release a trolley for me. I gave
him a five-dollar bill , but he refused to take
it. Thanking him, I put my luggage on
the trolley and moved to the taxi stand and took a taxi to
the East West University campus and
reached the Faculty house. Since my DD had
already reached them there was no problem in
getting accommodation. The lady at the counter checked my
passport and gave me a plastic card for entering the faculty
house from outside and into the apartment I was allotted. By swiping
the card, I could enter my
apartment which had all the facilities like a bed
room, small kitchen with a microwave oven and kettle for boiling
water. A coin box food kiosk was available in front of
the reception in which many things to eat could be obtained by
inserting required money into the slot.
Dosa and Idli were not available obviously,
but chips and fried rice were available. If
these frozen items are kept in
the microwave for two minutes, we could get very
tasty fried rice for lunch or sandwich for breakfast. Coffee
or cool drinks were available too.
The hotel where the
conference was being held was at a distance of
about 10 miles or so. But frequent buses were available.
A two-dollar ticket is to be taken and in between and I had to
transfer to another bus. The transfer ticket will be issued by the
driver himself as there are no conductors or cleaners in
the bus. In short, for spending 150 dollars for hotel
accommodation per day, I could live with just 29 dollars per day
including the apartment rent and bus fare up and down. As soon as
possible, I met my Bengali friends who helped me in getting the
accommodation gave them a can of rasgollas and Kerala painting made
of hay on black cloth background which I had carried with me. I
thanked them profusely for the kind help offered to me.
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