A nice journey

The last week was a blur of activity in preparation of my travel to the US. Packing for traveling to the US kept throwing up new 'must-carry' items everyday, and it was finally concluded on Saturday evening at 8.00 pm. Plus taking a backup of all the documents on the laptop, installing essential software, copying all the beautiful photos of the wonderful 3 months onto the ew laptop, getting all papers in place.It is always a good idea to check out your university's Indian students' association web pages for checklists and reminders. So i was finally set to leave yesterday at around 8 pm.

Our AD YES+ group got together last evening at 8 pm and we were all together till the airport. Plenty of wonderful conversations, and gifts were exchanged, We reached the Abu Dhabi airport at 11.20 pm last night and after completing the check-in formalities, I came out to the main gate where our group waited. Lots of hugs, wonderful memories, full hearts and gifts marked the meeting.

The BA flight for heathrow took off at 2 am, and 7 and a half hours later, i was flying through dense grey clouds into terminal 5 at London. The skies in london were so grey, it reminded me of all the english books i had read . And it was cold, yet the airport was spic and span. It looked sterilized actually, quiet and clean like the insides of a hospital. I visited the Heathrow lounge and found an interesting chewable toothbrush, a chewing gum with bristles which means you can discard the toothpaste and just chew on. Then there was the Multi-faith prayer room, a room with a chapel, prayer mats, and yoga books. I did my Kriya and sadhana here, and then had some of the lovely parathas mum had packed. I then proceeded to the departure gate, which was a good 7 minute walk from the lounge and our flight to the US was off an hour and a half after scheduled. Seems the captain found a funny 'smell' on the aircraft.

THe trip to Boston also took 7.5 hours. I had an interesting, scottish businessman for my neighbor. He heads marketing for a huge firm and shred nice insights into the marketing profession.We talked at length about politics, sports and was a lot of fun. When we landed at Boston, it seemed warmer than London, but was not. Turned out that American Airlines had left half the luggage in London, something they usually do, and i had to file a 'request' for my luggage with the American Airlines counter, who promptly drove the bag down to Uncle's house the next day.

The first few days at my aunt's place in the US have been interesting. Have learnt a bit about driving here, visited huge stores, eaten varieties of bacon, turkey and sausages made from tofu, and had a loong intense basketball game in UMass' massive indoor stadium today (there are 10 full sized basketball courts within a single structure). I considered myself fit, but the experience of working out with American college kids has left me with a stronger determination to adopt a better diet and fitness plan :) will experiment with rajesh bhaiya's high protein, low carb diet.

Will start with seva soon. Have just been absorbing all the wonderful Guru stories that chacha and chachi have, and have also been doing sadhana in the room Guruji gave darshan in.

Its a nice start overall, lets see how things shape up!