Fifty people had come to see me off at the Malaudh bus stop just a few hours prior. There were shouts and a clamor of excitement as everyone hugged me, wished me well, and ushered me onto the bus with my two suitcases, an extremely heavy trunk, and a bistra bandh, filled with bedding my mother had insisted I bring with me.
At noon on November 26, I arrived at the port in Bombay to check in with my luggage. Ships lined the dock, and people swarmed around me. I moved off to the side to say goodbye to Sat Pal and Krishan. Then I fell in with the jostling crowd. Once on the ship, I stood on the upper deck and waved to Sat Pal and Krishan for the last time. At that moment it truly hit me: I was leaving India. This is it, I told myself. There is no turning back. Tears filled my eyes as the ship pulled away from Bombay’s port. An hour later, I could see nothing but water sparkling in the sun.
Chapter 3
The journey from Bombay to London took fourteen days. For another week, I stayed in a guest house in cold, foggy London before boarding the SS United States bound for New York. After six long days at sea, we approached land and sailed into the harbor. I joined the crowd flocking to claim their luggage. The man at customs asked me a question (perhaps about the contents of my luggage), but I couldn’t understand a single word. His pronunciation was remarkably different from the British accent I was accustomed to. I kept saying, “No, no,” and the man smiled understandingly. He motioned for me to open the large trunk and saw it was almost overflowing with lentils and pickles.
“Are you a student?” he asked, speaking slowly and clearly.
I understood him this time. “Yes,” I said proudly.
“What school are you attending?”
“The University of Tennessee.”
“Good school. Good luck.”
He approved my luggage, and two porters helped carry it away from customs. I stood by my luggage and waited for my cousin in the icy December air. The frigid ocean breeze blew right through me. I pulled my oversized coat up to my chin and wondered where Ved was. Half an hour passed, and he still did not come. Had he not received my aerogram informing him of my arrival date? Finally, I signaled a taxi to take me to Ved’s apartment. The driver helped carry my luggage, saying, “Heavy, heavy,” as he loaded it into the car.
Around noon, I arrived at Ved’s apartment building. The taxi driver unloaded my luggage and placed it on the sidewalk in front of the door. He showed me his hands. “The luggage. Too heavy!” he complained. I paid him the price on the meter, but he showed me his hands again. “More money.”
“No, no,” I told him. “I need to save money. Go!”
The driver stormed away, muttering to himself as he slammed the taxi door and drove off. I knocked on Ved’s door, but no one came to let me in. Realizing my cousin must not have received my aerogram, I sat outside on the cold steps to wait until he came home in the evening. About twenty minutes later, an Indian man walked up to the apartment building.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“I am Krishan Bedi, cousin of Ved Bedi.”
“Oh yes. He told me you were coming, but we did not know when your ship would arrive. I live with your cousin. I will open the door for you.”
He helped carry my luggage into the apartment and asked if I wanted something to eat. I was starving so he made me a sandwich, and although I had not developed a taste for this type of food yet, I ate it anyway. After lunch, Ved’s roommate returned to work, leaving me alone in the apartment until evening.
At six o’ clock, my cousin came in carrying the mail from the mail box in the hallway.
“Krishan, you are here! I am so glad to see you. What a surprise!” He embraced me, and then showed me the mail.
“Look!” he said, laughing. “I got your letter today.”
When Ved saw my luggage, he exclaimed, “What is this? So much luggage! How did you bring it all? And a bistra bandh. This you will not need. Your landlord or landlady will provide all your bedding in Tennessee.”
“Yes, but it was my mother’s wish,” I explained. “I could not say no to her. I wanted her to be happy before I left.”
Ved just laughed. “Shall we have a cup of tea? I want to hear all about your journey.”
The snow fell in large clumps, covering the sidewalks and streets. I had never seen snow before or imagined it could feel so cold. Car exhaust turned the snow from sparkling white to gray in the streets, but the layers and drifts on buildings, houses, and store awnings shimmered brilliantly.
I had one week to learn about American culture and customs before I left for Tennessee. Red and green Christmas ornaments decorated storefronts and streets everywhere, while Christmas songs played on almost every radio station. I heard “Jingle Bells” so often I became amused and tired of it at the same time, even though I had not heard the song before. My cousin worked most days and spent the evenings with me. One night, he prepared a special drink for the Christmas season. “You’ll like it,” he said. “It’s just sweet milk, and it will make you feel good.” The first time, I drank it quickly. “Wait, drink it slowly,” he said. “There is whisky in it.”
“Oh boy, this tastes good!” I said. “What else is in it?”
“Sugar, beaten eggs, and cinnamon. It is called eggnog. People drink it during the Christmas holidays.”
One day, Ved asked Poornima, a good-looking Indian girl, to show me around New York City while he worked. At first I thought she was my cousin’s girlfriend, but later I learned they were just friends. She took me to the shops and treated me to lunch at a diner. I ordered a ham and cheese on rye bread with fruit. It was only my fourth day in America, but Poornima thought I was becoming Americanized well because I would say, “Yeah, yeah,” instead of “Yes” as teachers taught us in India. Actually, I couldn’t understand her accent, so I pretended to know what she was saying.
After spending six days in New York with my cousin Ved Bedi, he arranged for me to ride with a friend traveling to a small town in Virginia. From there, I took a bus to Knoxville, Tennessee. At 10:00 a.m. on December 29th, I arrived in Knoxville, where it had snowed several inches the night before. Ved had given me the address of the place he had stayed when he lived in Knoxville, Tennessee, and I gave the piece of paper to the taxi driver. Once we arrived at the house, the driver helped unload my luggage. He became upset, groaning and muttering loudly as he hauled the heavy luggage up the steps. Finally, we unloaded everything by the front door, and I paid him the money shown on the meter.
When I knocked, an old man in his eighties, came to the door.
“Ved Bedi. My cousin. He say you let me stay here,” I said in broken English. I showed him the address written on the piece of paper.
The old man looked at it blankly. “Eh? What do you want?” He tilted his ear toward me and spoke loudly. “If you’re selling something I’m not interested.” He started to shut the door.
“Stop,” I pleaded. “I am Krishan Bedi. You know my cousin. Ved Bedi. I am new in Amrika, need place to stay. I pay rent. Money,” I said loudly.
The man mumbled something I couldn’t understand. Frustrated, I pushed my way inside and held up the paper with the address. “Ved Bedi, Ved Bedi,” I repeated.
The man must have finally understood what I was trying to say, because he showed me to the bedroom and pointed out the kitchen and refrigerator. He opened the refrigerator. “Eggs,” he said, in case I was hungry. He coughed weakly into his hand, wandered out of the kitchen, and ambled up the staircase. Starved from traveling all night, I found a pan in a dusty cupboard, cooked the eggs, and ate them with bread and butter.
Afterward, I went to my room for a nap. Only the bedrooms were heated, using coal heat from a small grate built into the wall. I crawled underneath the heavy quilt on the bed and fell asleep.
The next day, I contacted Mohinder Sood, a friend of Ved’s. He invited me for dinner and introduced me to an Indian student who took me to see the university campus. After three days, I moved to a room in a house with three Indian s
tudents for twenty-five dollars a month. The old man had coughed constantly, and I feared I might become sick too. In India, coughing is a sign of tuberculosis.
On registration day, I went to the basketball stadium and wandered around for a few minutes before asking a student what I needed to do. He explained, but I stared at him blankly, not understanding his accent at all. Finally, he pointed at a row of desks pushed together with thick course booklets for the winter quarter piled on top. I watched students get in line, grab a booklet and a white index card, and sit on the floor to look through the booklets. I did the same.
An hour went by before I found my three courses and the sections I would like to be in based upon the timing of the other courses. Flipping through hundreds of pages and scanning thousands of lines took more than my limited knowledge of English would allow, but no one helped me, and I wouldn’t have understood them anyway. I joined the long line stretching from the front of the room to the back. When I reached the front, a lady called out, “Next!” and I gave her my card. She looked at it and checked the numbers with the data in front of her.
“I’m sorry, hon. These course sections are all filled up.”
“Excuse me?” I said, not sure if I’d understood her correctly.
“These. Course. Sections. Are. Full,” she repeated loudly.
I stared at her in disbelief.
“Choose different course sections.” She gestured to the space behind me. “Next!”
Wishing I had saved the page numbers, I sat down on the floor again to go through the long process of flipping through the Winter Courses booklet. Then I joined the long line once again, wishing I had eaten more for breakfast. At the front of the room, a different lady took my card.
“These sections are full,” she said.
My heart sank as I trudged away to begin all over again.
It was late afternoon by the time I returned to my house, feeling exhausted, depressed, and hungry. My housemates were lounging around the house, relaxed and in a good mood. Slowly, I made tea for myself, wishing for my mother, father, and sisters. Here in America I had no one to make tea for me or listen to my troubles and encourage me. Even though I was exhausted, I made the hot tea and drank it as I shared my registration experience with my housemates.
Two of them laughed. “It took us only two hours to register,” they said.
The other student felt bad. “I am sorry you had such difficulty. Tomorrow will be better.”
Before collapsing into bed, I ate a meal of peas and potatoes with bread and butter, washing it down with milk.
Yes, tomorrow will be better, I told myself. Hopefully.
For the first week of class, I wore a suit and tie, alternating between two hand-stitched suits I had brought from India. I wanted my professors to think I came from an educated family in a big city, but several Indian students told me I didn’t need to dress up for class, so I began dressing casually like the Americans.
Friends in India told me not to worry about my studies. The teachers would take it easy on me because they understood I was far from home. Unfortunately, the teachers did not show me any sympathy. Hundreds of students attended their classes. I was lucky if they even remembered my name. Earning a passing grade was solely my responsibility.
Even though I could not understand the lectures, I still took notes, copying whatever the professor wrote on the chalkboard. As the weeks went by, these notes remained stuffed in books or strewn across my desk, forgotten and not in the least understood.
Between classes I returned to the apartment, cooked a meal, and chatted with the other students I lived with. This soon became a comfortable routine. My studies fell by the wayside as socializing became my favorite part of my new life. If nothing else, I excelled socially. However, certain activities I did not understand.
For instance, I had never heard the term “dating” before. I was clueless about how to approach a girl and start a conversation. It seemed a necessary part of student life. My Indian friends advised me on how to approach girls.
“While you are in between classes,” one guy said, “if you see a nice-looking girl walking alone, ask her the way to the campus post office. Pretend you don’t understand the directions and ask if she will show the way. While walking to the post office, ask her name. If she is talkative, ask if she would like to go on a date.”
I decided to give it a try. One day while between classes, I saw a girl with long hair walking by herself. Underneath one arm, she carried several books. “Excuse me, excuse me,” I called out, jogging to catch up to her.
She stopped and turned around. “Yes?”
“Could you tell me the way to the post office?”
“Sure.” She started to explain, but I interrupted.
“I’m sorry. Could you show me the way?”
She smiled. “Of course.”
We started walking and talked briefly about our classes. She asked where I was from and if I liked living in the US so far. Before we reached the post office, I worked up my courage and asked, “Would you like to go on a date with me?” She looked surprised. “Uh, sure. What do you have in mind?”
“We could go to a restaurant. But I don’t have a car so I can’t pick you up. Do you have a car?”
“Yes. I can pick you up, I suppose,” the girl answered. “Where do you live?”
I told her my address just as we reached the post office. Before parting ways, we set up a time to meet. Then head down, deep in thought about where I might take her to eat, I made my way home to prepare lunch.
The next night, the girl picked me up in her car, and we drove to a cafeteria. Although my English was still rusty, I could converse well enough as long as I stuck with things I knew about, such as school, my life in India, and my journey to the States. I asked questions about her life, and even though I was still not accustomed to the accent, I understood most of what she said.
On the car ride home, I decided I would kiss her. “American girls like to be kissed in the car,” a friend once told me. At every stop sign, I tried to kiss her, but she only pushed me away, gave me a strange look, and continued talking. She didn’t act embarrassed or step on the gas to get me home quicker. Instead, she treated me kindly and talked about certain aspects of the town she thought might be useful or interesting to me. I wondered why she didn’t kiss me. Maybe not all American girls liked to be kissed in the car. She dropped me off at my apartment, and when I asked if we could get together again, she did not reply. She simply said, “Bye,” and drove away.
I hoped this would not be my last date, so with that in mind, I made preparations in case I brought a girl home in the future. Although I didn’t smoke, I kept a pack of Menthol Cools, a popular brand among girls at our school, in my section of the refrigerator. Even though I did not drink beer regularly, I kept Budweiser and Schlitz, popular brands, I’d heard, among American girls. If my date came to my place, I could offer her a beer and a cigarette.
My housemates told me, “It is customary to bring a girl to your place after two or three dates.” However, living with three other students made it difficult for this to happen. I couldn’t just bring home a date with three guys wandering around the house, listening to everything we said, and watching to see if the girls were cute. If I did invite a girl over, I would need to bribe my housemates to go to the library or see a movie. Then, if the girl agreed, I could bring her to my room and offer her a beer and a smoke. I rarely brought a girl home, but when I did, the guys were anxious to come back to their rooms and take a look at her.
Early in the quarter, I learned that a minister of a Baptist church had asked American families to invite foreign students to their homes for lunch on Sundays. One Sunday, the Regis family invited Hathi, one of my housemates, to come for lunch. My housemates and I suspected they asked him because he was good looking with blue eyes. Elizabeth Regis, the young, pretty wife, seemed eager for Hathi to join them, but Hathi was hesitant about going and told me he did not want to go at all. At t
he same time, he did not want to stand them up, since they were trying to do a nice thing.
“Hathi, I will go for you,” I said. In addition to wanting to help Hathi out, I was also curious about meeting this American family. I liked the idea of a free lunch. My housemates thought I was joking. Hathi stared at me as if I had just told him I wanted to quit school and fly to the moon.
“Are you serious?” he asked.
“I am serious.”
Everyone felt it would be strange, but it didn’t seem like a big deal to me, so I didn’t care what they thought.
“What will she think?” one of my housemates asked.
“What if she says no when she sees Bedi and asks for Hathi anyway?” said one of the others.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea. She’ll never invite anyone to lunch again.”
They all turned to me. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“I am sure.”
At about eleven o’clock, I got ready and waited for Mrs. Regis to arrive in her car and take me to her house. Hathi hid in his room. Shortly after eleven, Elizabeth knocked on the door. Instead of Hathi, I came down the stairs. She looked at me for a second, and then introduced herself, shaking my hand. Politely, I said, “Hello. My name is Krishan Kumar Bedi.” She didn’t ask a thing about Hathi.
Elizabeth took me to her home, introduced me to her husband and two children, and served lunch. Afterward, Elizabeth and her husband gave me a tour of the Kingston Pike residential area before dropping me off at my house. Her husband, the owner of Regis Steakhouse in downtown Knoxville, gave me his card. “It’s been a pleasure having you, Krishan,” he said as I got out of the car.
When I entered the house, all the guys were anxiously waiting for me. “What happened?” they asked. “What did she say and do? Where did she take you?”
“Calm down. Nothing happened,” I said.
In the meantime, while I met new people and made many friends, my grades suffered. I rarely studied and was never prepared. One day, my professor announced a pop quiz.
Engineering a Life Page 3