The People of America!

It was a great experience to travel more than 8000 miles in 15 days covering the entire east coast and southern America. Starting from Chicago the adventure included NYC, Boston, Washington, Philadelphia, Rhodes Island, Niagara, 1000 Island (1840 to be precise!), Virginia, Tennessee and then Florida! During these days I got a chance to interact with all kinds of people, from different backgrounds, different ethnicities and different cultures.

Although America looks the same everywhere with freeways going either N-S or E-W, fast food restaurants wherever you see, smiling people greeting “hello, how are you doing!” just to acknowledge your presence, STOP signs everywhere, Jogging people at odd times of the day or dancing on the rhythm of the music plugged into their ears…. There are different shades to them if one looks closer!

Unlike people in and around 42^nd Street 7^th Avenue NYC (Times Square) who are “upscale” neatly dressed with suit and tie and polished shoes, rushing to their office places in the morning time or sitting on some 83^rd floor in a glass cabin with a mac in front of them and a personal secretary (lady) on their right… the countryside men and completely laid back… Chillaxed!! :P Its simple.. nothing as Grandeur or glittering as you will see on the east coast or silicon valley.

By countryside I mean the people I observed in Virginia, Tennessee provinces. These are the people who tame horses, pigs and cattle, wear hats and 6 pocket jeans, have acres and acres of farm lands and probably a gun. I will call them close to cowboys! These people seem to be more attached to the family. Wherever I went I observed entire family.. a married couple, the in laws and the children.. together (living happily).

Great people with great hospitality! I happened to visit one of their shows (The Dixie Stampede Dining Show) where they portrayed their “cattle skills”, narrated the development

of the race around Tennessee State and enacted the war that took place between the North and South Tennessee. The show was jaw dropping and to add to the flavor the dinner was mind-blowing. We were served one FULL roasted hen!! Along with vegetable soup, boiled corn, slice of pork, a potato and then desert… with NO silverware!! Great experience to eat a full roasted chicken with hands! J The show concluded with countryside music and people dancing happily.

Chinatown is one more shade. Not only people, but everything is in Chinese.. shop names, billboards, prices everything. Its a totally different world when one enters the Chinatown. The buildings have stairs on the outside..The lodges are disgusting with common toilets, there is garbage on the streets.. and also the following sign can be seen in Chinatown NYC.

Florida was all together a different story. Orlando is full of children, tourists.. Thanks Walt! I hardly saw any “Americans” as I descended to south. The Orlando-Miami journey gave a flavor of our good old ST bus (rest is now self explanatory! which includes the driver, passengers, bus, lay over restaurants etc…!). Miami is full of people either from Cuba or Mexico.. I don’t know how to differentiate.. but my point is.. Here I met natives who can’t speak English. Inner parts of Miami had more old people busy in their diurnal activities.. Similar kind of people like you can see when you travel from Panjim to Vasco in the morning. Miami reminded me of Goa except the tourists.. tourists are more “bold” here!! :P

That was my journey.. Next is the west coast… which is one more different flavor of the America… the “Desi America”!!