I want to grow old with you

This is one phrase i have read in many M&B books and even otherwise. I always found it very romantic. If some is still not sure about what I am saying here, well its kind of a marriage proposal... it goes on like this - I love you, I want to marry you, I wanna have kinds with you, I want to grow old with you...will u marry me? And then the girls gives a million dollar answer - Yes! (well a million-dollar answer I say bcos after that the guy ends up spending all his million dollars he has on her for the rest of their live, until death or divorce do them apart) But thats not the main point here. The main point is that phrase - I want to grow old with you.

Why all of a sudden am talking about this? Well simply because being in Vienna at the moment I am getting an opportunity to see a lot of elderly couples these days. They make a sweet pair. They are on their vacation, mostly alone, and they seem to be enjoying each others' company thoroughly. I get to meet them every day during the breakfast in the hotel. I particularly like them... because they hve indeed grown old with each other but are not bored of each other - something that I see in the elderly couples of our country, and that includes my parents, my in-laws as well. Are they not in love? Am sure they are, but they surely are not as expressive as these people from the otherside of the world are.

They hold hands and walk together - I have never seen my parents walking side by side, forget holding hands. Men in our country prefer walking atleast 100 miles ahead of their female counterparts! Check out on your parents, on your uncle-aunts, am sure you will notice this trend without any exception (and incase you do find any exception, please let me know - I would love to meet such a lovely couple in our country as well!) They sit together and have breakfast - our mothers have this tendency of feeding their "husbands" first! and the husbands also are too happy to have the meal before their wives! These elderly couples are enjoying theri lives...hassle free, tension free, roaming around the world. But look at our parents - can they even think of going for a vacation - only the two of them, leaving us behind? Oh am sure the mothers will dies at the thought of leaving their grown up kids, and the fathers will faint at the thought of being alone with their wives for 7-10 days! When circumstance forces them to travel together (and believe me, its mostly emergency not a vacation - like they going to their son or daughter's place who stay in a different city/country) - they travel as if they are absolute strangers!!! or enemies bonded together. The day I was travelling to Vienna from Kolkata, I met an aunty in the bus towrds the air-craft, who, according to herself was travelling with her husband to UK where her son stays, but believe me I couldnot even trace the uncle - Aunty was busy toking to me, she was excited as it was her first time, and when I asked her, "Are you traveeling alone", she said, "Na na, tomar kaku o ache amar shonge" - this is another amazing thing about our mothers and aunts - they will die but not call their husbands by their names! My mother wanted to pass this on to me, I had very politely(my version of politeness) refused! Anyways, coming back to this aunty, when she told me that "my kaku" was also there, I strated looking for him, then she said , "ei ekhanei kothao hobe"!

I see my father-in-law always shouting at my mother-in-law or scolding her when they are travelling together - as if she just cannot do anything right!

I love my India, but these are the things that disturbs me - we dont know how to respect another human being, more so if that human being is our better half! This is in our blood. We love to shout at each other. In the western part, they may have more divorces...but if they are together, they are in love. And if they are in love, and while they are in love, they treat each other well.

I learnt from this elderly couples, what it is like to grow old together gracefully and lovingly...not like growing old together because we have no options. In India coupls are like that...they are together because they have no options...are they still in love? They might like to ask this question to themselves.

Coming back to elderly couples, well, I like them immensely in this part of the world. They are indeed growing old together... God bless them.

And as I sit in my hotel room, all alone, writing this...I wonder silently... Will I really grow old with him...together? like these people out here...or will my mother be successful in passing on the heir... i wonder will i hold his hand when am walking on the road, or will he be miles ahead of me... i wonder will we call each other sweetheart and darling... or will we even not bother to call each other...

The more I wonder, the more Doris Day takes over me...Que Serra Serra...

Days in Vienna

Vienna is a lovely place - i dont think I need to update you on that. Many of you must have already been here, if not then heard about it. The weather at the moment is jus perfect. The roads are so wide, clean and peaceful. The shops on the roads are what dreams are made up of. The buildings so antique yet well maintained. All take together just the place to be.

Even then the last 2 days of my life have been not very good for me? You may ask why? You may tell me that many would like to trade places with you. Nice city to be in, staying in the best of hotels, having best of food and over the weekend no work pressure to add it on... why cant you just be happy???

I will tell you why. I am glad that I am in Vienna - a place I always wanted to visit. So thank you God. Its a tourists' paradise. And you can make that out once you are on road. All around me are families, couples of all age groups and groups of young friends. Every one has company here. And there I am, all alone surfing the roads aimlessly. Looking at a kids store and thinking how Millie would have enjoyed here. Looking at the roadside cafe' and almost visualising how HE would have loved to sit there with HIS beer. Seeing couples walking on road holding hands and feeling a pang somewhere deep within.

Vienna is a nice place to be - only if you could be with yuor loved ones. I wish I had them with me here. Strolling down the roads would have been so much fun holding the hands of my loved ones. Having ice cream would be so much fun if fighting for a bite with my daughter. Window shopping would have been so much fun if mother-daughter could share some fashion tips!

Am nnot jealous to see happy faces around me, just wish I could also be one of them.

...to be continued

Vienna Diary

I was scheduled to travel to Vienna for a month on an official trip. For the first time I was travelling abroad alone and hence I was a bit confused. I say confused, because I really dont know exactly what I was feeling...the feeling was like a very toxic concuction of various stuffs, and the best or the worst part is that you dont even know all of them!

Anyways, the day came drwaing near and near... and then came 21st Aug'09 - bon voyage... the flight from Delhi-Vienna was at 01:50 hours, so you can well imagine my condition by the time I was standing i a huge q infront of the check-in counter. And standing there I realized the following

1. India is NOT a poor country - otherwise how can u explain that long queue? It seemed as if the whole of India (and part of world) was travelling to Vienna or somewhere in Europe!!!
2. Slowly I reached the front of the queue and then got the first blow - I have 6 kgs of excess baggage and so have to pay the charge or reduce the weight. Since I couldnot have possibly done the latter I paid excess baggage charges. 20kgs for 1 month trip is too less!!!

After I got my boarding pass and my wallet was 13,000 INR lighter I proceeded towards the emigration counter which also had a huge q as expected. There the following realizations struck me

1. We keep accusing Indians of being ill mannered, but believe me 2 Japanes tourists wanted to break the queue and was caught tresspassing lol... I am a proud Indian.
2. I am a proud IBMer as well. This tag helped me with a smooth emigration process - smoother than my contemporaries standing there.

After the emigration was done, I had to go through customs clearing as well - why? dont ask... bcos earlier I had paid excess baggage. There the questions were the most irrevalent I have ever heard. Wonder, with this kinda questionnaire, how do they manage to detect foul praeys?

Anyways, after all of that went near Gate No 9 where from we were expected to board - boy!!! there was no place to stand, forget a chair to sit!!! Was wondering, so many people travel out of India every day???!!! I was sleepy, hungry, tired and exhausted... oh yes, and thirsty as well. mentally very disturbed, felt like crying for obvious reasons... lonely and...anyways, i think you get the picture. Time passed by as it waits for none. And then finally boarded the air craft. There I had the following realizations

1. The only way an international aircraft differs from a domestic one is the breadth! Otherwise the place is as less as that in the latter!!! I had an aile sit and fortunately there was a young girl sitting right next to me. We stuggled to fit in our respective seats and ended up pushing each other for a bit of excess space - but alas, there was none!
2. Then around 3AM, they provided us dinner. I was excited to see them approaching but then realized I had no apetite to have them.
3. They were showing Ghazini, wtched some part n then did the most difficult thing of my life - tried to sleep in there!!!
4. The air craft was reminding me of AC chair cars in Trains in India. Struggled to sleep for a couple of hours. Dont remember whether was already awake or woke up... but it was around 6AM (IST) that I felt the need to go to loo.
5. Came out and had nothing to do so was waiting for breakfast. They served us breakfast and then soon after that we landed.

My first feeling was that - wow! I landed in Vienna!!! But as I looked outside the window, it seemed no different than Bangalore or Hyderabad airports (cant even say Kolkata Airport though). Experience inside the airport was such that I felt we Indians are much more cordial. But may be am biased. A few disturbing stuffs

1. They are very reluctant to speak in English - hardly matters if you dont understand their language.
2. The luggage trolleys were not FREE!!! u had to insert some coin - and since I had no coin, I had to pull in my own luggages.

I came outside and saw a very friendly looking person holding my name and waiting for me. He gave me a firendly smile, took my luggages and even advised me not to buy Calling Cards from the airport as they would be expensive. As we drove outside the airport, I first had the glimpse of the city. Boy, Vienna is beautiful, calm, and extremely firendly - it didnt seem like a stranger to me at all. Reason? Well there are plenty of them

1. Thecars on the road were no alien - I saw SKODA OCTAVIA, CIELO, MATIZ and all sorts of thoer big/small cars we see in India. Some of the cars which I had not heard about earlier(never mind I have a very poor knowledge on cars) resembled like some distant cousins of the cars on Indian roads - like ESTEEM, HYUNDAI ACCENT etc. The only car i missed there was Maruti 800!!! :-)
2. The buildings were so similar like the ones we have in Kolkata around BBD Bag area - ofcourse these were much well-maintained.
3. The trams! and the tram lines
4. The billboards had similar advertisements and brands - only the language was different

Soon e reached our hotel. Its a nice hotel, but again being biased that I am, I prefer our hotels. Breakfast was nice and the room though small was cosy and comfortable. Soon I settled in and slept off.

... to be continued