ON THE JOB TRAINING --USA-- HOW TO SIT IDLE

“‘No English,’ boli doh tho, pachi mathakut nahi kare”. This was the statement of a Gujarati parent who was successfully idling time with me. He was from Rajkot district from an interior village and was having a forced stay of six months in New Jersey to be with his grandson. Not knowing any language other than Guajarati, my association to him in idling was a great boon and he expressed the first sentence of the para on Immigration clearance where not knowing English ended up as an advantage. 

IF BORED INSIDE THE HOUSE CAN SIT HERE TOO

Though visiting USA is viewed as a privilege by the non-privileged, the visit comes with lot of pain and agony of sitting idle. The hosts mostly both working go to work by 8am in the morning and will be back by 5pm or later. Mostly tired they grab the child for de stressing, and give parents break from baby caring and release and relief out of home. ‘Parole park’ was the name given by the Gujarati mate and sitting there we used to share our life back in India and how we idle at New Jersey.

NO DOUBT A DREAM HOUSING COLONY ONLY THAT IT IS IN USA

Weekends are a huge relief as normally there will be outing to sightseeing places which is possible only if the hosts take us in car as there are no other modes of transport or facility to move around, as independent travelling in unknown places is risky Also. If struck somewhere, there is none to guide as there is hardly anyone in the streets waiting or knowing to guide. Remember you also do not have a phone that has enough connectivity. 

Niagara falls, Delaware water gap, Philadelphia, New York, Washington DC were some of the places people in New Jersey could visit on weekends. Visiting such places is a huge celebration after a week of idling though every week tourism is not practicable. The hosts have lot of cleaning, washing to be done of floors, cloth and car and such weekends are all the more painful when other fellow idlers get busy visiting places.

IF TRANSFERRED YOUR CAR TRAVELS LIKE THIS

Hazen Court was the name of the colony in Wayne that had around 200 houses widely distributed in about 50 acres of land that consisted of Common Park, general parking, laundry room, play areas, and a long winding well cemented corridor that covered the entire residential area of the housing complex. In fact such well laid corridors are so wide spread in entire town of Wayne, walking was a pleasure also since the weather used to be cool even in summer and getting up early is not necessary to complete walking quota that senior citizens need to undertake. Children used to play on the skater chasing each other and it was a sight to watch as one walked and jumped to give way to the skater.

 

I did take risk and chose to travel on my own through tour operators and fortunately there were good number of Indians in each tour and Gujarati tourists some with Bank of Baroda connection added charm to my visits. Yet it was traveling for three days in a trip and idling for about ten days before the next venture, used to be the routine.

 

 The view from home on the left and autumn changes color of leaves as they fall on the right.

Weekends without tourism but with outing was a milder relief. Walmart, Costco, Kmart, Burlington, Target were some of the shopping areas that needed visit for purchase of household items and visiting them was a relief though no celebration like sightseeing. Patel Stores, A2B hotel, Sukhadia Restaurant were some of the shops in Parsippany of New Jersey that had huge Indian crowd and visiting them and having Indian food made one feel at home. Visit to Edison and Iselin towns and viewing shopping boards of Gujarati names like Kalpesh, Bhavesh and Harshad and also seeing many Indians in the market gave a unique peace of mind from the drudgery I chose to eat a pan costing one dollar and more. 

OUR HOUSE IN THIS BUILDING IN WAYNE NEW JERSEY

Get up late at 6am, have coffee, watch TV, sit idle up to 8am, go for walk, back at 9 to have breakfast, idle till bathing, idle till lunch, try to sleep, idle till 5pm, have coffee, go to the parole park to chat with the Gujarati.   This was the routine for most days and many others too had similar routine. Walking to nearby shops to buy vegetables or other items one per day was an invention I made for better time pass. 

Hence any outing in weekends to a renowned tourist place used to be a day of ecstasy and even visit to a mall or temple used to be a very happy experience. But as the grandchildren grow, we also grow in age and travelling sixteen hours in flight becomes painful. The child too grows with age culturally, colloquially, and emotionally more in a culture whose trajectory is away from the ethos and values we are familiar with and want to inculcate. 

Job in the USA fetches lot of money, but how to live in USA with the Indian culture intact and imbibed and fence out other ethos among the children born to be brought up there is a continuous combat the mind undergoes without answers.

Thus visiting USA to many is like handling roses. The thorn sometimes pierce hard and pains longer and the rose loses fragrance slowly but surely. 

                               Still visit USA once.

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