My Journey to US...

It took sometime coming...yup finally found little time to recollect things...

It was an unusual Thursday morning in Chennai. It started raining early morning. Rain in Chennai that too in summer... i thought something good & diffrent must be coming . It was day for my appraisal also!! so i felt i would get a good rating. when i walked into office my RM called me and asked my resume.. and said some onsite openings are coming so my name is pipeline. I thought its usual round of trailer show played by my RM. Appraisals began three team mates finished by lunch..we had huge discussion b4 lunch with everyone and even they said that they would be sent onsite pretty soon. So in lunch we left over guys discussed what would be our action plan for discussion. After lunch i walked in and my RM called and said i have to fly next week for California!! shocked.. surprised..hmm totally lost... appraisal after that was just a formality..everyone in team were also shocked at this news... it was an unexpected...

After that it was a total mess...had to vacate Chennai in a hurry... had to complete travel formalities... had to attend a training in Hebbal office, Bangalore...running here and there for lot of things, packing...so on... Finally day had come ... Could not meet any friends... informed them over phone, mail. My relatives came to our home that noon for lunch..so met almost everyone. Bon Voyage!! hmm tats what most of them wished me.

Reached Blore airport around 10.15pm... security and immigration clearance were pretty smooth. Had Lufthansa(Boeing 747) flight at 1.55am on 13th may. It was surprise that i met one of my practice leads in airport. He was on his way to London, but via Frankfurt. So we were on same flight. I also happened to see people like Nandan Nilekanni, Mahadavan Nair..so on... hmm that's kind of ppl u find on international flying. It was first time in my life i was flying out of my country and it was special.

Reached Frankfurt after 9 and half hours flying, reached there at 7.30am local time. Smoothly got though security at transit and had to wait till 10.30am for next flight to Detroit. But flight got delayed by 30min due to some system failure at north Atlantic. Finally boarded Airbus 330 Lufthansa around 11 am. It was another 9 hours flight. It was great experience to fly over Greenland, and the ice cover over mountains just looked amazing. Finally reached Detroit around 1.30 pm local time. Had the immigration and customs clearance. Got my baggage and again got it checked in for San Francisco in North West Airlines. Detroit airport is simply awesome. Had to walk around 2-3 km inside airport to reach my terminal A 70. My flight to SFO was at 7.35 pm. So had lot of time at Detroit airport..just roamed around. Had got 'Hoolige' from home so ate it there. It was awesome and gr8l!! :)

Finally reached SFO at 9.30 pm local time after flying five hours from Detroit in Airbus 250. Mr. Atwal, a sardarji...the cabby came to pick me at airport. From SFO airport... Marianis Inn hotel is about 35 miles around 30 min drive. So reached there around 10.30pm. Finally i was in Santa Clara,US. It took totally 34 hours journey in which 24 hours were flying time.. rest was which i spent in airport. In my entire life prior to this i had flight journey only thrice. But in this one journey alone i had to change three flights. Travelled around 11,000 miles all alone. It was fun travelling.. reached different places, different time zones, met different kinds of people... A journey worth remembering... my first international journey..it was indeed a special one.

For making my journey special all credit must go to my parents... i had just 5 days to pack up. but i never found time to pack as i was busy in training and completing other travel related things... i don't know when my parents packed all my stuff... they had made sure to put each and everything... from groceries to medicines to clothes... so a big thanks to everyone... right from my parents... relatives... friends... my company ppl for giving the opportunity... AND definitely GOD for everything......

Watched "Mungaaru Male" in US!!

hmm...finally i got to see the classic.. the sensational hit..the mega blockbuster movie "Mungaaru Male" in California,US. The movie got released in December'06 last week ...it became such a mega hit but i could never make it to this movie. Since i was in working Chennai... even when I was in Bangalore for 4-5 weekends between Jan and May.. due some reason or other i never got a chance see it !!.

Finally it happened on May 20, 1pm show... Venue:India Movie Center, San Jose, California, US. Watching this movie with other Kannadigas in US was gr8 and had fun. It was just by luck that i found that this movie is running here. I was going through some North California Kannada koota website(kknc.org) and saw that 'Mungaaru Male' has been released here on May 11th and is running successfully. wow!! tat was a gr8 piece of news for me and i just decided to watch the movie in weekend.

I don't have to say much about the movie... everyone knows its awesome. But still i have to say about the picturisation of malnadu i.e madikeri, sakleshpura, jog.. its simply amazing... gr8 dialogues..its a simple story but effective.. had good fun watching it. It was special watching a Kannada movie in foreign country. I read that Mungaaru Male part 2 is coming up...Hope more and more "Mungaaru Male" happens in Kannada industry... let the song go on.."ಮುಂಗಾರು ಮಳೆಯೇ ಏನು ನಿನ್ನ "

--

Rak