An Ethiopian taxi driver in Columbus, OH, offered marriage to me.
He felt that his US Citizenship made him irresistible. When I laughed, he chided me: “No no, I am serious. Take my card.” It took some amount of firmness to dissuade him.
He was driving me from the Columbus airport to the Greyhound bus terminal. The meeting was at Cincinnati, but the airfares had been prohibitively expensive. So the smart of idea of flying to Columbus and taking the bus from thereon had been hatched. It was thus I landed in Columbus, bright eyed and busy tailed, on Tuesday morning.
My driver handled my rejection gamely with “You Indians only marry Indians no?” He then proceeded to show me the meager and underwhelming landmarks of Columbus downtown. It was disappointing really, because from the air, Columbus looked like the modern day cousin of the “village we know so well”. There were neatly arranged houses in tidy neighborhoods everywhere. From 20,000 ft, it certainly looked like peace was reigning.
But downtown was characterless, a little helter-skelter, and overambitious. An all too short a ride through its streets later, we landed in front of the Greyhound terminal.
Have you ever driven through poorer neighborhoods in the US? Have you felt the unspoken menace in the air, even though there is nobody around and everything is ominously still? Well, Greyhound terminal was rife with such danger.
It was in a gray alley. It was tucked about 50 ft from the road. The walkway was charmless, with litter fluttering around. Two or three youth were insouciantly hanging about the entrance. With a sinking heart, I pushed the door and entered a harshly lit but poorly upholstered interior. The first sign I saw was “firearms are not allowed on the buses.”
The next poster I saw was “It’s not too late to go back home,” addressed to at-risk teenage runaways. There seemed to be a few of them at the terminal. The young man in a jaunty hat, his girlfriend in seriously torn jeans, that young lady on the floor who had a shock of bright green hair accentuating her blonde tresses , all looked like they escaped the sets of Trainspotting 2.
I had about 90 minutes to kill. Realizing that spending them at the terminal was out of question, I ran out and started wandering around downtown Columbus in an aimless manner. The very first thing I ran smack into was the Statehouse building—a sprawling beautiful monument. I don’t what Columbus-ians think of it, but I thought it was a tad too big for the city. I found the 7 ft statue of Columbus holding a globe in his hand pensively on its grounds deliciously pompous.
I really shouldn’t be irreverent to the building or the state because of the role it played in the Civil War. I found a very interesting plaque on the Underground Railroad that was active in Ohio before the war.
As I walked around, I was accosted by a group of Vegans who were spreading awareness. When the lady said, “there is Vegan chicken available!” I couldn’t resist responding: “What? I am a vegetarian!” The ornate Ohio Theater was screening John Wayne’s Rio Bravo (1959) as the premier show of the summer movie series. I was charmed by Columbus’ answer to Times Square on High Street. I decided to have food at Cinco’s, a regular Mexican place in a fancy building, overlooking the video walls.
By now, it was time to go back to the bus terminal. We were shuffled on to the bus, which lived up to expectations. While not being overtly dirty, the interiors threatened to unravel in that direction any moment. We were asked not to sit on a couple of seats because “they are broke”. I found chewing gum stuck to the a/c vent below my window.
I was joined on the next seat by Bunty, an unmistakably Punjabi young man, who insisted that I should watch Veer, the DVD of which he was carrying. When I demurred, he rummaged through his collection, anxious to find something that will suit my taste. But since he only had “Pakistani drama”, we settled that he was just not destined to provide me with entertainment. Luckily, he didn’t propose marriage, which could be because of this girlfriend in Jalandhar with whom he talked nonstop for two hours. He said she fights with him “too much” because of “shaq”.
My ride to Cincinnati was otherwise eventless and quite brief. The rest of the evening was spent in preparing for the meeting next day. Things flowed in the manner of these things—we started out with total confusion, got some clarity after a couple of drinks, got hysterical at some point, and then ended in grunt work. We also ate a lot of food in the meanwhile, including a latish run to the nearby Chipotle.
This afternoon, after the meeting, all of us set out for our respective destinations back home. S gave me a ride to Columbus. I wanted him to stop at some place so that I can take some pictures for my website (http://futloose.com/blog for those who haven’t still seen it). S had been running a fever for the past two days and justifiably wanted to just get back home.
But I cribbed and cribbed in the car and made him stop at a rest place. As we walked around in the small woods, we found a lot of dog poop and mushrooms. Within an area of 50 sq. feet, we saw about a dozen species of mushrooms. Perhaps dog poop is the best manure for mushrooms. After capturing these colorful little fun-gis on my camera, we set out.
Unbeknownst to me, S had another surprise in store. A few miles down the road, he suddenly exited the highway and entered seriously rural environs—long roads amidst woods, fields, grazing horses and goats, scattered farm houses, and dairy farms. It all ended in a scenic little lake called Caesar Lake. Summer sun was making the sky an endless expanse of blue with painted on plump clouds, the water jade green, and the trees a lush green.
After spending a happy 20 minutes there, we sped back to Columbus. As usual, our flight was delayed. S started looking very ill indeed. We finally stumbled into our plane. We landed in Chicago literally under a cloud conglomerate. The city looked like some gothic painting, all grays and smog and a smear of scarlet in the horizon.
It all looked gloriously complex and inviting.
He felt that his US Citizenship made him irresistible. When I laughed, he chided me: “No no, I am serious. Take my card.” It took some amount of firmness to dissuade him.
He was driving me from the Columbus airport to the Greyhound bus terminal. The meeting was at Cincinnati, but the airfares had been prohibitively expensive. So the smart of idea of flying to Columbus and taking the bus from thereon had been hatched. It was thus I landed in Columbus, bright eyed and busy tailed, on Tuesday morning.
My driver handled my rejection gamely with “You Indians only marry Indians no?” He then proceeded to show me the meager and underwhelming landmarks of Columbus downtown. It was disappointing really, because from the air, Columbus looked like the modern day cousin of the “village we know so well”. There were neatly arranged houses in tidy neighborhoods everywhere. From 20,000 ft, it certainly looked like peace was reigning.
But downtown was characterless, a little helter-skelter, and overambitious. An all too short a ride through its streets later, we landed in front of the Greyhound terminal.
Have you ever driven through poorer neighborhoods in the US? Have you felt the unspoken menace in the air, even though there is nobody around and everything is ominously still? Well, Greyhound terminal was rife with such danger.
It was in a gray alley. It was tucked about 50 ft from the road. The walkway was charmless, with litter fluttering around. Two or three youth were insouciantly hanging about the entrance. With a sinking heart, I pushed the door and entered a harshly lit but poorly upholstered interior. The first sign I saw was “firearms are not allowed on the buses.”
The next poster I saw was “It’s not too late to go back home,” addressed to at-risk teenage runaways. There seemed to be a few of them at the terminal. The young man in a jaunty hat, his girlfriend in seriously torn jeans, that young lady on the floor who had a shock of bright green hair accentuating her blonde tresses , all looked like they escaped the sets of Trainspotting 2.
I had about 90 minutes to kill. Realizing that spending them at the terminal was out of question, I ran out and started wandering around downtown Columbus in an aimless manner. The very first thing I ran smack into was the Statehouse building—a sprawling beautiful monument. I don’t what Columbus-ians think of it, but I thought it was a tad too big for the city. I found the 7 ft statue of Columbus holding a globe in his hand pensively on its grounds deliciously pompous.
I really shouldn’t be irreverent to the building or the state because of the role it played in the Civil War. I found a very interesting plaque on the Underground Railroad that was active in Ohio before the war.
As I walked around, I was accosted by a group of Vegans who were spreading awareness. When the lady said, “there is Vegan chicken available!” I couldn’t resist responding: “What? I am a vegetarian!” The ornate Ohio Theater was screening John Wayne’s Rio Bravo (1959) as the premier show of the summer movie series. I was charmed by Columbus’ answer to Times Square on High Street. I decided to have food at Cinco’s, a regular Mexican place in a fancy building, overlooking the video walls.
By now, it was time to go back to the bus terminal. We were shuffled on to the bus, which lived up to expectations. While not being overtly dirty, the interiors threatened to unravel in that direction any moment. We were asked not to sit on a couple of seats because “they are broke”. I found chewing gum stuck to the a/c vent below my window.
I was joined on the next seat by Bunty, an unmistakably Punjabi young man, who insisted that I should watch Veer, the DVD of which he was carrying. When I demurred, he rummaged through his collection, anxious to find something that will suit my taste. But since he only had “Pakistani drama”, we settled that he was just not destined to provide me with entertainment. Luckily, he didn’t propose marriage, which could be because of this girlfriend in Jalandhar with whom he talked nonstop for two hours. He said she fights with him “too much” because of “shaq”.
My ride to Cincinnati was otherwise eventless and quite brief. The rest of the evening was spent in preparing for the meeting next day. Things flowed in the manner of these things—we started out with total confusion, got some clarity after a couple of drinks, got hysterical at some point, and then ended in grunt work. We also ate a lot of food in the meanwhile, including a latish run to the nearby Chipotle.
This afternoon, after the meeting, all of us set out for our respective destinations back home. S gave me a ride to Columbus. I wanted him to stop at some place so that I can take some pictures for my website (http://futloose.com/blog for those who haven’t still seen it). S had been running a fever for the past two days and justifiably wanted to just get back home.
But I cribbed and cribbed in the car and made him stop at a rest place. As we walked around in the small woods, we found a lot of dog poop and mushrooms. Within an area of 50 sq. feet, we saw about a dozen species of mushrooms. Perhaps dog poop is the best manure for mushrooms. After capturing these colorful little fun-gis on my camera, we set out.
Unbeknownst to me, S had another surprise in store. A few miles down the road, he suddenly exited the highway and entered seriously rural environs—long roads amidst woods, fields, grazing horses and goats, scattered farm houses, and dairy farms. It all ended in a scenic little lake called Caesar Lake. Summer sun was making the sky an endless expanse of blue with painted on plump clouds, the water jade green, and the trees a lush green.
After spending a happy 20 minutes there, we sped back to Columbus. As usual, our flight was delayed. S started looking very ill indeed. We finally stumbled into our plane. We landed in Chicago literally under a cloud conglomerate. The city looked like some gothic painting, all grays and smog and a smear of scarlet in the horizon.
It all looked gloriously complex and inviting.
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