“Yes, yes,” I said quickly.
My father and I said “Hello,” “Hello” again, but before I could get another word in, my father said, “Here is someone who wants to say hello to you.”
The other people wanted to hear my voice, and while I said “Hello” to each of these people, I kept thinking, I have made the call to talk to my father and mother, and here the whole neighborhood has come to say hello. After spending so much money—seven dollars for the first three minutes and two dollars per minute after that—I felt I should get to talk to my parents more.
After nine minutes, the maximum two extensions, the operator cut me off. I went to bed and stayed awake the whole night thinking about my parents and visualizing the scene at the post office and the Mandi Ahmed Garh exchange. It made me laugh, knowing my parents would give the phone to the neighbors, and I felt good after hearing their voices. However, I did not try calling my parents often after that. The battery at the post office was always low, and calling was a long and tedious process—staying up late all those nights waiting for a connection, and my parents needing to travel to Mandi Ahmed Garh on someone else’s scooter.
The year 1970 brought about several major changes in my life. With the help of Professor Buchan, I landed a job earning $15,000 per year at a 450-bed hospital in Covington, Kentucky. As the director of management engineering at St. Elizabeth Hospital, my career took a turn for the better. Mr. Gilreath, the hospital administrator, showed me a great deal of respect. I was more than happy to leave my job at Vanderbilt University Hospital and my apartment at the Executive House. Relieved to be out from under the watchful eyes of Mrs. Olsen and Maelie, I did not stay in touch with them. I looked forward to this new chapter in my life.
My first day was more than I could have asked for or imagined.
“Welcome to St. Elizabeth Hospital, Mr. Bedi,” Mr. Gilreath said when I arrived at his office. He grinned and shook my hand with a strong, enthusiastic grip. At once, he threw an arm around my shoulder and led me along the hallway and down the stairs. “We’ve got your office all ready for you. You’ve got your own secretary too, by the way.” I was moments into my first day, and it couldn’t be going any better.
The office was good-sized with an oak desk and matching chair. As we entered, a girl stood to greet us, flashing a pleasant smile.
“Mr. Bedi, this is Susan Moore, your secretary,” Mr. Gilreath said. “She is an English major at Thames Moore College in Crestview Hills, Kentucky, seven miles from here.”
As I shook her hand, I smiled to myself, knowing I would have many reports for her to type up and proofread. Already I could see I would get much more done here than at the previous hospital. Nodding at Susan politely, I followed Mr. Gilreath back to his office.
At nine o’clock, Mr. Gilreath called a meeting in the board conference room next to his office. He ordered donuts, coffee, and orange juice for the thirty department heads and administrative staff members filing into the room to greet me. The room contained only twelve to fourteen seats, so many of the managers stood. I sat next to Mr. Gilreath, drinking my coffee and smiling politely while Mr. Gilreath addressed the room.
“Mr. Bedi is from India and has studied at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, where he received his master’s degree in industrial engineering,” he began. “He has work experience at the Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville. Today he is starting his position as director of management engineering, and he will be reporting to me. I ask all of you to extend your cooperation and help Mr. Bedi with whatever he needs to know.”
During that time, not many people could say they were experienced in management engineering in the healthcare field. After all the studying and working dozens of jobs to pay for school, I felt I should enjoy the attention. I had driven all night and reached my new apartment at 4:30 a.m., only sleeping for a few hours in my car. Now I wished I had arrived the day before so I could feel more rested for my first day. Even though I was tired, I made an extra effort to show how happy I was to be there.
After the reception, I followed Mr. Gilreath around the hospital while he explained its organization and his vision for the facility. I admired his eye for improvement and his determination to make changes. His confidence in my skills and knowledge gave me a renewed sense of purpose.
One late evening, while drinking hot tea after work and walking around in my undershirt and underwear, I heard a knock on the door. Who could this be? I wondered. I just moved here, and I don’t know anyone. Another knock sounded, and still in my underwear, I opened the door.
“Hi there,” said the tall, broad-shouldered man with a friendly face. “My name is Bob Vanherpe. I’m here to invite you to a get-together at my place this Saturday night.”
For a moment I just looked at him. I don’t know anybody here, I thought. He must have the wrong apartment.
“You are trying to invite me?” I asked. “Are you sure you are not at the wrong door?”
“Oh no,” he said. “Are you Kris? You just moved in?”
“Yes, I am.”
“I am inviting you Saturday evening for beer and snacks,” he repeated. “The apartment complex manager told me you just moved here from Nashville.”
Pleasantly surprised, I invited him in for a beer.
“Sure,” he said, walking in while I pulled on my pants. When I opened the refrigerator, I found there was only one can of beer.
“You can have it,” I offered.
“Oh no, we will share,” he insisted.
I popped the tab, and we each drank half the beer.
As I set the empty can on the counter, Bob said, “Why don’t you come to my place for a beer if you are not busy this evening?”
“Sounds great,” I said, not having anything better to do.
At his apartment, Bob introduced me to his girlfriend, Evie, who lived with him and worked as a registered nurse in Cincinnati.
“She is from a small town near Lexington, Kentucky, farther south of here,” Bob told me. He affected a thick southern accent, and said, “She’s my hillbilly.”
Evie groaned and rolled her eyes. “He’s always making fun of my accent,” she said. “Nice to meet you, Kris.”
It was the beginning of a great friendship. We both enjoyed social outings and drinking beer with friends. I liked to try new things and meet new people, and as the weeks went by, Bob enjoyed bringing me with him everywhere he went and introducing me to everyone he knew.
Almost every day at around 4:30 p.m., Bob would call and say, “Hey, Kris, what’s going on?” Somehow he would convince me to meet him at the Press Club, the local bar, for a cold beer. One or two people always met us at the bar, and they would buy a round. I was a novelty that Bob wanted to show off to all his friends, the “new kid on the block.”
Sometimes on the weekends, Bob and I would go to the local brewery, Hudepohl Brewing Company in Cincinnati, and buy half a keg of beer. Bob knew everyone in the sales office there and introduced me to them. A keg, about fifteen gallons, cost thirty-eight dollars, and lasted the entire weekend and sometimes into the week.
One Sunday afternoon in late June 1970, I went to Bob’s place for a social gathering. As people arrived, I poured beer into cups from the keg tap and handed it to them. Bob had bought the keg on Friday and kept the beer iced so it would stay cold. There were about ten or twelve people standing in Bob’s living room. George, a state senator, sipped his beer and watched me out of the corner of his eye. I had met George at Bob’s place a while back, and he knew I was from India and was close friends with Bob. It seemed he did not like me as much as everyone else did.
“Hey Kris,” he said as I poured another beer for one of Bob’s friends. “The beer tastes flat.”
A complete silence fell over the room. Everyone watched me to see what I would say. George looked at me with a challenging expression.
Turning around, I replied, “George, how can a free beer be flat? It is cold, it is free, and someone is serving y
ou. How can it be flat?”
Everyone laughed and looked at George. He looked embarrassed and didn’t know how to respond to my remark. Later, he tried to make a comeback.
“Hey Kris, can I ask you a question?” he said.
“Sure,” I replied. “It’s a free country.”
Other people were listening with interest. Knowing this and hoping he would embarrass me this time, George asked, “Is it safe to go to India?”
“Hell, no,” I exclaimed. “The moment you get off the plane you will find people with knives, swords, and guns slaughtering each other and then coming at you!” I imitated the high-pitched noise an American Indian would make by clapping my hand back and forth over my mouth.
Now everyone was listening.
“George, you don’t need to go to India to look for trouble,” I said. “Just go to the northern part of Covington, Kentucky, and there you’ll find it.”
Everyone laughed and stared at George for asking such a question. Bob, happy with my comeback, raised his cup of beer to me while everyone resumed their conversations. This story was told many times to newcomers to Bob’s apartment, and no one ever dared to say the beer was flat again, even if it was.
I loved my new job, and most of all, I liked my new boss. He was a man to be respected, and I felt honored to report to him. For my first project, Mr. Gilreath asked me to evaluate the laundry equipment for a replacement plan to meet the demand for clean linen supplies and to provide timely service. The flatwork ironer needed constant repair and was causing an overflow of laundry needing ironing, meaning more overtime pay to the staff.
At the end of June 1970, Mr. Gilreath invited me to attend the annual convention for the American College of Hospital Administrators (ACHA) in Houston, Texas, along with the other hospital administrative staff and their wives. Once we reached Houston, I flipped through the telephone directory to find an Indian to call, preferably a Singh since there were quite a few of them in the US at the time. If he were willing, perhaps he could show us around Houston. To an American, making such a request to a stranger, even a fellow countryman, would seem odd. At the time, this was my way of doing things.
I contacted Mohinder Singh and told him who I was, that I was from Punjab and was in Houston for a conference. I mentioned that several members of the administrative team and their wives wanted to explore the night life in Houston. Mr. Gilreath could not go with us because of a meeting, but he told us to have a good time.
Mohinder agreed, and he picked us up at our hotel.
“Would you like to go to the Body Shop?” he asked everyone.
“Sounds good,” we all replied, having no idea what a Body Shop was.
It turned out the Body Shop was a bar, and not an ordinary type of bar either.
Not long after we sat down and ordered drinks, several girls wearing bikini tops and G-strings came to our table. Everyone’s eyes widened, and the wives stared at each other in shock. We didn’t know what to do. We couldn’t leave after already ordering drinks. One of the girls set a container of brushes and some paints on the table. Apparently, we were supposed to paint the girls’ bodies. The wives of the older gentlemen were fuming.
Walter, the Director of Finances, however, was having a good time. He picked up a paintbrush and began painting one of the girls. The other girl eyed us seductively. “Anyone else want to give it a go?” she offered. The older man’s wife kept shooting him angry stares. Mrs. Gilreath, sitting next to me, thought it was the funniest thing, and neither of us could stop laughing at the shocked looks on the older ladies’ faces. Mo sipped his beer, smiled, and nodded at us, seeming oblivious to the tension between the women.
A few nights later, while Mr. Gilreath was getting his ACHA certification, I stood in line with Mrs. Gilreath for a steak dinner and rodeo show. We wore name tags on our wrists, and as we handed our tickets to the woman sitting at the ticket table, she looked at Mrs. Gilreath and asked, “Where is Mr. Gilreath?”
Mrs. Gilreath gestured to me and said, “I am with him.”
The lady glanced at my name tag, which clearly said, “Krishan Bedi.”
Mrs. Gilreath repeated with a smile, “I’m with him.” Then, linking her arm through mine, she gave a little laugh.
The lady looked confused and finally threw her hands up in the air. “Whatever you say, honey. If it’s okay with you, it’s okay with me!” Mrs. Gilreath and I grinned at the lady’s reaction, and I was amused that Mrs. Gilreath was so comfortable with the notion.
Once back in Covington, Walter Albrink talked constantly about Mo and the Body Shop and the “good time” he gave us. Everyone had plenty of laughs from that week in Houston and thanked me for finding Mo.
Chapter 12
In August 1970, I received my green card, the permanent residency visa I applied for while I was at the Vanderbilt University Hospital. I wrote to my parents right away: “I am making plans to come to India in a few weeks,” I said. “Please start looking for a suitable girl.”
My parents wrote back immediately, overjoyed to know I was finally coming. They said that once I arrived they would put an ad in the Tribune regarding a suitable girl.
I wrote back that I would not have that much time, so they should have the ad prepared by my brother-in-law, Vijay Kaura, and put it in the newspaper before my arrival so the girls’ parents could send their biodatas, which were a simple description of the girl’s personal and family background. Then my father could go through the biodatas and pick the ones most suitable for us. Once I arrived in India, we would send my biodata to the parents of the most suitable girls and go from there.
My father liked the idea. He and my brother-in-law prepared the ad. It said: “We require suitable match for handsome, smart Kshatriya boy. Master’s degree from the US, good-paying job as director. Girl should be educated, willing to travel to US, from a respectable family. Send biodata to P.O. Box XYX Tribune.”
While my excitement grew, Mr. Gilreath called me to his office to let me know he felt uneasy that I would be taking time off so soon. He wanted to know if I would be submitting my final report and recommendations for the laundry study before leaving. I assured him I would.
Not knowing if he approved of my leaving three months after joining his hospital had weighed on my mind. Mr. Gilreath indicated as long as I finished the laundry project, he was fine with my taking time off. In the end, my report showed a savings of $40,000 per year in the processing of laundry following my recommendations. Mr. Gilreath was pleased with the results.
The list of items to take to India grew long as my departure date approached. The general impression in India was that money hangs on the trees in the US. You just shake the tree and gather the fallen money. Through my letters, I communicated that this was not the case. But the perception of easy money in the US was so strong that if I did convince my relatives that I didn’t have this kind of money, they would say I might not have found the right tree. People would say that so-and-so has sent lakhs (hundreds of thousands) of rupees, and so-and-so has constructed a huge house with money sent by his son in the US. True, there are such cases where some Indians in the US might have sent significant amounts of money, but people in India do not know what kind of lifestyle those Indians are living in the US.
Although I tried to convince my parents that money didn’t fall from trees, I did not want to give them the impression that I did not have any money. Because I had worked for almost two years after receiving my degree, I should have saved plenty of money. In reality, I did not put money in my savings account, although I was living a good life with a good-paying, respectable job, nice clothes, a good place to live, and a healthy social life. I justified to myself that although I did not save much money, I had worked hard during all those summer jobs and the tough first year at UT. I deserved to live a good life. I wasn’t spending lavishly or throwing money away on foolish items, but I was living comfortably, and that much I thought I deserved.
Included in the list of items,
my parents asked me to bring clothing for my nieces and nephews. My father wrote, asking for a two-in-one, which was popular in the seventies because it was a radio that also contained a tape recorder. One day I received another letter from my father, stating, “Please purchase a .32 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver for your brother. It is popular item among a somewhat elite group of people.”
Not thinking much of it, I left the letter on the table and went about my usual business. Then my brother pleaded again through my father’s letter: “Your brother says he has not asked for anything. This is only one thing. He would be very happy to have it.”
Ever since my brother was a young boy, he had the ability to convince my parents to get him whatever he wanted. On the other hand, if I wanted something, it didn’t matter how small or large, there was always a big discussion about the matter, and then my brother must also give the okay. It took almost two years to convince my father to buy me a bicycle. I started asking for it in the beginning of ninth grade, and finally, my father purchased it right before I finished tenth grade.
It seemed my brother would get his way once again. Even my mother pleaded, saying, “Krishan, do bring the revolver for your brother.”
I could not say no to my mother.
That night, I talked to Bob about buying a revolver. He knew all about guns, and he couldn’t wait to help me pick one out. In the end, we chose a .32 caliber Smith and Wesson snub nose with a wooden handle for $90, as well as a cartridge box for $8.50.
Shortly before my departure date, I bought and shipped a refrigerator and air conditioner to my parents. Although $650 was the most I had ever spent on any purchase at one time, I told myself that these items would be long lasting and would give my parents comfort during the sweltering hot summer months. In addition to purchasing items for my family, I purchased most of the items that my parents requested on behalf of family members. However, with all the demands I received, my mother did not ask for anything. Her message was simple: “Krishan, just come home. You have been away from me for nine years. I just want to see you, hold you close to me, and hug you for a long time.”
Engineering a Life Page 15