Meeting on the Tour Bus
Apr 15 2008 | Views 1181 |
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Tags: Desi US College Professor Meets Desi English Beauty in NY Tour Bus
Tags: Desi US College Professor Meets Desi English Beauty in NY Tour Bus
I met her on the tour bus going round New York City. I was an Indian hick from California, who was visiting New York for the first time and she was a Desi chick from the UK, similarly making her maiden voyage to the Big Apple. The latter fact was garnered after we met and talked.
I had lived in the west coast of the US for ten years mostly at Stanford. I had completed a Master's and a PhD in the course of six years and for the last four years was a tenure track assistant professor at Stanford. I had thus lived in Palo Alto, Stanford's home, the last decade and had my fill of the dating scene there. I had dated women of all colors, ethnicities and political and social prejudices. I had found none that I could say that 'that is the girl I would like to wake up to, for the rest of my days'.
She appeared to be on the right side of thirty. She had passed that first blush of youth that bespeaks innocence but also vulnerability. What I saw before me was a confident young woman willing to take on the world. She stood only a few inches shy of my height of five foot ten, was a little on the thin side but well built on what young men of my persuasion would call, 'the right areas'. Her coloring was what in Tamil would be called Ma Neram, or the color of darkening wheat. Her face was regular, her nose aquiline, her chin long and her face and cheeks thin. Her lips were sensuous and full, she was the picture of a dusky beauty.
She walked past a lot of seats and sat down beside me and smiled a demure hello. It was a recognition of something shared, that I felt unusual for Indians abroad in public places, who choose to wear a fixed frown and completely ignore any Indian passing by. This friendly gesture was unusual and in view of what I saw of her, to me, quite welcome. "First visit to New York ?" I asked conversationally hoping she would answer, she replied with a smile in clear a clipped accent" Yes, my first trip to America, it all seems a bit overwhelming". My eyes asked the obvious question: She smiled and said" It is all the hustle and bustle of New York. My last few years were spent at a quiet University" she added as an explanation. I said" My name is Abhinav, abhi for short". "Oh, I am Rima, Rima for short" she replied with a smile.
" I am in the same boat, I have been at Stanford ever since I came to the US, ten years ago. Initially a grad assistant's salary or lack of it, prevented travel and later it was the work. This is my first trip to the East Coast " I said. She smiled understanding.
The tour bus was a double decker and we were sitting in the open second decker. We were going up Sixth Avenue, also called the Avenue of the Americas driving towards the the Lincoln Center. The guide in his nasal twang, a strong southern accent, unusual for New York, he was talking about Lincoln Center: "The Lincoln Center houses such global institutions, as the New York State Theater, the Avery Fisher Hall, the Metropolitan Opera, usually called the Met and the Vivian Beaumont Theater. We might be able to catch a glimpse of a live rehearsal in one of the theaters. Lets see !" He said. The bus stopped in front of the Lincoln Center and we trooped out. These were beautiful modern glass fronted buildings built round a beautifully built square with fountains in the middle.
We stopped in front of a fountain. I held out my camera she nodded, but stopped me. She walked up to a Japanese tourist, gesticulated some and returned with him. She asked for my camera, passed the camera on to the tourist
and led me proprietary fashion to one of the fountains. We posed and the tourist clicked. "I hope it comes out well" I said inconsequentially, though in my heart this first photograph was ,I hoped, a part of a lifetime of photographs with this woman. I will give you my address in England" she said, meaning that she would like to have a copy of the photograph." Where in England" I asked. "Oh I am a Lecturer at Somerville, a women's college at Oxford, I teach history." I nodded, my academic training beginning with IIT, Kanpur and then my years at Stanford, were in Matematics and applied physics, a far cry from history and Oxford. But what the hell, I said to myself, variety is the spice of life!
There was a live rehearsal of a play going on at the New York State Theatre, and a number of the tour group followed the guide to the theatre. I decided to do otherwise. "Rima, I would like to spend the rest of the afternoon visiting two museums, the Guggenheim and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Would you like to join me ? We could have a spot of lunch before that" I said with a silent appeal in my eyes, which she apparently saw and acknowledged. " That will be nice shall we tell the guide ?" she asked. "I shall do that right now. "I said and went up to the guide and explained our change in plans. He looked up and took a look at both of us and nodded smiling. There was no smirk in that smile, it was a smile of understanding and empathy. I guess he had seen a lot of such diversions in the past. And essentially wished the both of us, the best of luck.
It was lunch time, so I took her to an Indian restaurant on 58th street. While we went and picked up our buffet(all we could eat for $14.99) we went back to our seats. I noticed that she had kept away from the meat dishes, as I had, but I had chosen the fish curry, which she did not. "So, are you a vegetarian ?" I asked.
"Nearly ten years ago, while I was a student at Oxford, I had seen a documentary on how the meat industry slaughtered its cows,sheep and chicken, I have since stayed away from anything that had previously lived and moved." she said. "Except for fish I have been a vegetarian at least for the last five years, I do not like the harmones that the animals for slaughter are fed to fatten them up " I replied. She nodded and smiled. I like her smile, because when she did, her whole face lit up and the dimple on her cheek showed prominently.
I did not want to probe as much as I wanted her to know about myself. "I am on the faculty at Stanford, teaching electrical engineering, and I have come to New York for a I triple E conference. I triple E is an institution for Electrical and Electronics engineers" I explained.
We talked non stop until finally we noticed that the food on our plates had been untouched. We talked about what we liked, what we disliked, our parents, our siblings about whatever came into our minds. When we were done, we started all over again.We wolfed down the cold food, oblivious of the taste and only conscious of each other.
I notice she smiled a lot while we talked. But then her face became grave and her eyes filled with pain: She said with a sigh" I have come to meet my friend. I knew that it was a euphemism for boy friend. "We were close for a couple of years, while he was at Oxford, on a Rhodes. He has returned to the US and so I thought I will come and see him, to see if there is still something to go on." I was both flattered and not a little disappointed by her frank disclosure. She looked at my serious face and continued. " I met Bill this morning for breakfast and have promised to see him at dinner tonight" she said evenly.
If she was coming to the US to meet her boy friend, the common practice would be to stay with him. But I had heard her in the passing tell me that she was staying at the Ramada near JFK Airport. Why was this girl choosing to do that ? I mused. She continued" I think after all this time and the space between Bill and I, it is important that we decide what to do next. Apparently, in a stream of consciousness way, talking to herself aloud, she said " Now I meet you, I do not know if it means something, but it must, It bloody well must ". Then realizing that she had said the whole thing aloud she looked a little shocked.
"Rima, I know my mind after these couple of hours. But I think you must too , Go and find out for yourself what you want to do. If you decide to go with Bill, I will be quite depressed, but I will be OK and I will wish you both happiness for the rest of your lives. But, before you go I want you to know that though Stanford is not Oxford, Palo Alto is a great place to live. But, if you want me to settle in Oxford, to marry you, I will settle there and if necessary I will settle in Ulan Bator(it is in Outer Mangolia) to get you." She looked at me, confused, betwixt and between and gave me a weak smile. "Cheer up" I said adding," Look at it as an opportunity to choose what you are going to do for the rest of your life. Being selfish, I am rooting for me being the lucky guy, but may the best man win !" This round about offer of marriage, would have not only been considered strange but also quite kinky, by most people used to a long courtship.
It was now three o'clock in the afternoon, Rima would have to return to her hotel and change for dinner. We decided just the Guugenheim would do for today. In my heart of hearts, I hoped that there would be many other such days. We had our fill of contemporary art. Jackson Pollock who had been mentored by Peggy Guggenheim in his early years has been long featured at the Guggenheim. And we wandered around taking his riot of color, both of us loved the joie de vivre that his paintings exulted in.
We bid each other goodbye, I was staying at the Pierre, and we gave each other addresses and telephone numbers and went our ways. In life, I have been a quiet, normal and reasonably calm guy. But these were unusual, once in a lifetime set of circumstances. I decided to call it quits, had a desultory dinner, worked on my presentation before the IEEE and went to bed.
The ringing of the telephone disturbed my sleep. I looked at the clock on the mantlepiece, it was 2 AM. I picked up the phone with some trepidation. " Abhi, I really do not mind Stanford, could they use a teacher of medeival English history ?" "Sure" I said, "then there is Berkeley and also a lot of other schools." I gave a whoop of sheer unadulerated joy that was met by a giggle from Rima. "Bill and I had dinner and I had already made up my mind soon after I left you. I decided I would be living a lie if I married him and were still thinking of you. I knew I would not be doing the vice versa, after marrying you. That decided it and I told him. I told him that I had found you. He was very nice about it but I had some suspicion that in the interevening years he had moved on. He wished me luck." I said" Give me an hour I will see you at the Ramada, Come to think of it I have not ever kissed you and I want to see how it would feel to kiss the girl for the first time, to whom I have already proposed and with whom, I fully intend to spend the rest of my living days!"
I had lived in the west coast of the US for ten years mostly at Stanford. I had completed a Master's and a PhD in the course of six years and for the last four years was a tenure track assistant professor at Stanford. I had thus lived in Palo Alto, Stanford's home, the last decade and had my fill of the dating scene there. I had dated women of all colors, ethnicities and political and social prejudices. I had found none that I could say that 'that is the girl I would like to wake up to, for the rest of my days'.
She appeared to be on the right side of thirty. She had passed that first blush of youth that bespeaks innocence but also vulnerability. What I saw before me was a confident young woman willing to take on the world. She stood only a few inches shy of my height of five foot ten, was a little on the thin side but well built on what young men of my persuasion would call, 'the right areas'. Her coloring was what in Tamil would be called Ma Neram, or the color of darkening wheat. Her face was regular, her nose aquiline, her chin long and her face and cheeks thin. Her lips were sensuous and full, she was the picture of a dusky beauty.
She walked past a lot of seats and sat down beside me and smiled a demure hello. It was a recognition of something shared, that I felt unusual for Indians abroad in public places, who choose to wear a fixed frown and completely ignore any Indian passing by. This friendly gesture was unusual and in view of what I saw of her, to me, quite welcome. "First visit to New York ?" I asked conversationally hoping she would answer, she replied with a smile in clear a clipped accent" Yes, my first trip to America, it all seems a bit overwhelming". My eyes asked the obvious question: She smiled and said" It is all the hustle and bustle of New York. My last few years were spent at a quiet University" she added as an explanation. I said" My name is Abhinav, abhi for short". "Oh, I am Rima, Rima for short" she replied with a smile.
" I am in the same boat, I have been at Stanford ever since I came to the US, ten years ago. Initially a grad assistant's salary or lack of it, prevented travel and later it was the work. This is my first trip to the East Coast " I said. She smiled understanding.
The tour bus was a double decker and we were sitting in the open second decker. We were going up Sixth Avenue, also called the Avenue of the Americas driving towards the the Lincoln Center. The guide in his nasal twang, a strong southern accent, unusual for New York, he was talking about Lincoln Center: "The Lincoln Center houses such global institutions, as the New York State Theater, the Avery Fisher Hall, the Metropolitan Opera, usually called the Met and the Vivian Beaumont Theater. We might be able to catch a glimpse of a live rehearsal in one of the theaters. Lets see !" He said. The bus stopped in front of the Lincoln Center and we trooped out. These were beautiful modern glass fronted buildings built round a beautifully built square with fountains in the middle.
We stopped in front of a fountain. I held out my camera she nodded, but stopped me. She walked up to a Japanese tourist, gesticulated some and returned with him. She asked for my camera, passed the camera on to the tourist
and led me proprietary fashion to one of the fountains. We posed and the tourist clicked. "I hope it comes out well" I said inconsequentially, though in my heart this first photograph was ,I hoped, a part of a lifetime of photographs with this woman. I will give you my address in England" she said, meaning that she would like to have a copy of the photograph." Where in England" I asked. "Oh I am a Lecturer at Somerville, a women's college at Oxford, I teach history." I nodded, my academic training beginning with IIT, Kanpur and then my years at Stanford, were in Matematics and applied physics, a far cry from history and Oxford. But what the hell, I said to myself, variety is the spice of life!
There was a live rehearsal of a play going on at the New York State Theatre, and a number of the tour group followed the guide to the theatre. I decided to do otherwise. "Rima, I would like to spend the rest of the afternoon visiting two museums, the Guggenheim and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Would you like to join me ? We could have a spot of lunch before that" I said with a silent appeal in my eyes, which she apparently saw and acknowledged. " That will be nice shall we tell the guide ?" she asked. "I shall do that right now. "I said and went up to the guide and explained our change in plans. He looked up and took a look at both of us and nodded smiling. There was no smirk in that smile, it was a smile of understanding and empathy. I guess he had seen a lot of such diversions in the past. And essentially wished the both of us, the best of luck.
It was lunch time, so I took her to an Indian restaurant on 58th street. While we went and picked up our buffet(all we could eat for $14.99) we went back to our seats. I noticed that she had kept away from the meat dishes, as I had, but I had chosen the fish curry, which she did not. "So, are you a vegetarian ?" I asked.
"Nearly ten years ago, while I was a student at Oxford, I had seen a documentary on how the meat industry slaughtered its cows,sheep and chicken, I have since stayed away from anything that had previously lived and moved." she said. "Except for fish I have been a vegetarian at least for the last five years, I do not like the harmones that the animals for slaughter are fed to fatten them up " I replied. She nodded and smiled. I like her smile, because when she did, her whole face lit up and the dimple on her cheek showed prominently.
I did not want to probe as much as I wanted her to know about myself. "I am on the faculty at Stanford, teaching electrical engineering, and I have come to New York for a I triple E conference. I triple E is an institution for Electrical and Electronics engineers" I explained.
We talked non stop until finally we noticed that the food on our plates had been untouched. We talked about what we liked, what we disliked, our parents, our siblings about whatever came into our minds. When we were done, we started all over again.We wolfed down the cold food, oblivious of the taste and only conscious of each other.
I notice she smiled a lot while we talked. But then her face became grave and her eyes filled with pain: She said with a sigh" I have come to meet my friend. I knew that it was a euphemism for boy friend. "We were close for a couple of years, while he was at Oxford, on a Rhodes. He has returned to the US and so I thought I will come and see him, to see if there is still something to go on." I was both flattered and not a little disappointed by her frank disclosure. She looked at my serious face and continued. " I met Bill this morning for breakfast and have promised to see him at dinner tonight" she said evenly.
If she was coming to the US to meet her boy friend, the common practice would be to stay with him. But I had heard her in the passing tell me that she was staying at the Ramada near JFK Airport. Why was this girl choosing to do that ? I mused. She continued" I think after all this time and the space between Bill and I, it is important that we decide what to do next. Apparently, in a stream of consciousness way, talking to herself aloud, she said " Now I meet you, I do not know if it means something, but it must, It bloody well must ". Then realizing that she had said the whole thing aloud she looked a little shocked.
"Rima, I know my mind after these couple of hours. But I think you must too , Go and find out for yourself what you want to do. If you decide to go with Bill, I will be quite depressed, but I will be OK and I will wish you both happiness for the rest of your lives. But, before you go I want you to know that though Stanford is not Oxford, Palo Alto is a great place to live. But, if you want me to settle in Oxford, to marry you, I will settle there and if necessary I will settle in Ulan Bator(it is in Outer Mangolia) to get you." She looked at me, confused, betwixt and between and gave me a weak smile. "Cheer up" I said adding," Look at it as an opportunity to choose what you are going to do for the rest of your life. Being selfish, I am rooting for me being the lucky guy, but may the best man win !" This round about offer of marriage, would have not only been considered strange but also quite kinky, by most people used to a long courtship.
It was now three o'clock in the afternoon, Rima would have to return to her hotel and change for dinner. We decided just the Guugenheim would do for today. In my heart of hearts, I hoped that there would be many other such days. We had our fill of contemporary art. Jackson Pollock who had been mentored by Peggy Guggenheim in his early years has been long featured at the Guggenheim. And we wandered around taking his riot of color, both of us loved the joie de vivre that his paintings exulted in.
We bid each other goodbye, I was staying at the Pierre, and we gave each other addresses and telephone numbers and went our ways. In life, I have been a quiet, normal and reasonably calm guy. But these were unusual, once in a lifetime set of circumstances. I decided to call it quits, had a desultory dinner, worked on my presentation before the IEEE and went to bed.
The ringing of the telephone disturbed my sleep. I looked at the clock on the mantlepiece, it was 2 AM. I picked up the phone with some trepidation. " Abhi, I really do not mind Stanford, could they use a teacher of medeival English history ?" "Sure" I said, "then there is Berkeley and also a lot of other schools." I gave a whoop of sheer unadulerated joy that was met by a giggle from Rima. "Bill and I had dinner and I had already made up my mind soon after I left you. I decided I would be living a lie if I married him and were still thinking of you. I knew I would not be doing the vice versa, after marrying you. That decided it and I told him. I told him that I had found you. He was very nice about it but I had some suspicion that in the interevening years he had moved on. He wished me luck." I said" Give me an hour I will see you at the Ramada, Come to think of it I have not ever kissed you and I want to see how it would feel to kiss the girl for the first time, to whom I have already proposed and with whom, I fully intend to spend the rest of my living days!"
© Girdhar Gopal., all rights reserved.
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