It was a little late at night by the time I got dressed. The restaurant in the hotel had already closed. My friends and I were hungry and wanted to get something to eat. Being new to the place, we asked the clerk at the front desk for suggestions.
America can be quite intimidating to the newcomer. After a long and tiring flight from Bombay, I had checked into the hotel. The jet lag was enough to disorient me, but the hotel room did not help matters. Everything seemed topsy-turvy. The key had to be turned the wrong way for starters. The switches on the lamps could be turned in one direction only. Trying to turn the lamp off by turning the knob backwards did not seem to work and I had to unplug the thing from the wall ultimately so that I could take a nap. Then came the shower. Adjusting the single circular control to get the water to the right temperature proved to be a surprisingly challenging task. Let me just say that I ultimately came out about even in my battle with the shower faucet, meaning I barely escaped being scalded. Somewhat humbled by all this, I was a bit nervous by the time I came down to the lobby.
The clerk told us 'to take Lancaster and go past a couple of lights' where we would find places to eat. We looked at each other puzzled. She seemed to be using English words, but they did not make sense to us and so we sought clarifications. She said, 'Lancaster Pike', by way of explaining. When this too failed to register in our foggy state, with a hint of impatience, she pointed to the road outside which happened to be the said Lancaster. Thus enlightened, we asked her if the restaurants were within walking distance since we did not have a car. 'I guess you can go walking', she replied and seemed more than a little puzzled that we did not have a car. Well, we did not even have a driving license then but we did not tell her that. It might have caused her to faint.
Thinking that 'Couple of lights' must mean 'pretty close by', we set off on foot. The road was deserted. We felt pretty self-conscious to be the only people walking. There was no sign that we were close to any place of business. After a few minutes and several lights, it dawned on us that the clerk must have meant traffic lights and not street lamps. It took us a good twenty minutes of walking before a pizzeria came within our view. We decided to get pizzas for dinner there. I must mention here that none of us had actually seen a pizza before. We had only heard about it. This was more than thirty years ago and pizza had not yet arrived in India.
After our encounter with the desk clerk, I knew that it would not be easy but it turned out to be exhausting to get through the whole ordering process because the man at the counter had to explain many things to us and we had to repeat ourselves several times before we were understood. There were many agonizing decisions that we had to make regarding the crust and the toppings without having the slightest idea of what we were choosing. Our multiple Indian accents certainly did not help matters.
After we finished ordering, the man asked, 'For here, or to go?'. It took us a couple of iterations to get this riddle unscrambled. When we thought we had understood the question, we said somewhat triumphantly, 'We would like to eat here and then go' and waited for our pizzas.
It would be nice if pizzas came with a warning, but I think there is a sort of initiation rite to pizzas that everyone must go through. The cheese and the sauce are at insanely high temperatures thus ensuring that the first bite invariably burns your mouth. After we peeled the hot cheese off the roof of our mouths, we ate what we could (it looked like we had ordered enough food to last us a couple of days - another rookie mistake) and got up to leave when we were startled by the waiter asking us if we wanted him to pack up the remaining food for us. We had never heard of this in India. The idea struck us as bizarre and we declined his offer.
Thus ended our first outing in America. We thought we spoke perfectly decent English, but that was obviously not going to be enough. We would need some serious schooling in American.
America can be quite intimidating to the newcomer. After a long and tiring flight from Bombay, I had checked into the hotel. The jet lag was enough to disorient me, but the hotel room did not help matters. Everything seemed topsy-turvy. The key had to be turned the wrong way for starters. The switches on the lamps could be turned in one direction only. Trying to turn the lamp off by turning the knob backwards did not seem to work and I had to unplug the thing from the wall ultimately so that I could take a nap. Then came the shower. Adjusting the single circular control to get the water to the right temperature proved to be a surprisingly challenging task. Let me just say that I ultimately came out about even in my battle with the shower faucet, meaning I barely escaped being scalded. Somewhat humbled by all this, I was a bit nervous by the time I came down to the lobby.
The clerk told us 'to take Lancaster and go past a couple of lights' where we would find places to eat. We looked at each other puzzled. She seemed to be using English words, but they did not make sense to us and so we sought clarifications. She said, 'Lancaster Pike', by way of explaining. When this too failed to register in our foggy state, with a hint of impatience, she pointed to the road outside which happened to be the said Lancaster. Thus enlightened, we asked her if the restaurants were within walking distance since we did not have a car. 'I guess you can go walking', she replied and seemed more than a little puzzled that we did not have a car. Well, we did not even have a driving license then but we did not tell her that. It might have caused her to faint.
Thinking that 'Couple of lights' must mean 'pretty close by', we set off on foot. The road was deserted. We felt pretty self-conscious to be the only people walking. There was no sign that we were close to any place of business. After a few minutes and several lights, it dawned on us that the clerk must have meant traffic lights and not street lamps. It took us a good twenty minutes of walking before a pizzeria came within our view. We decided to get pizzas for dinner there. I must mention here that none of us had actually seen a pizza before. We had only heard about it. This was more than thirty years ago and pizza had not yet arrived in India.
After our encounter with the desk clerk, I knew that it would not be easy but it turned out to be exhausting to get through the whole ordering process because the man at the counter had to explain many things to us and we had to repeat ourselves several times before we were understood. There were many agonizing decisions that we had to make regarding the crust and the toppings without having the slightest idea of what we were choosing. Our multiple Indian accents certainly did not help matters.
After we finished ordering, the man asked, 'For here, or to go?'. It took us a couple of iterations to get this riddle unscrambled. When we thought we had understood the question, we said somewhat triumphantly, 'We would like to eat here and then go' and waited for our pizzas.
It would be nice if pizzas came with a warning, but I think there is a sort of initiation rite to pizzas that everyone must go through. The cheese and the sauce are at insanely high temperatures thus ensuring that the first bite invariably burns your mouth. After we peeled the hot cheese off the roof of our mouths, we ate what we could (it looked like we had ordered enough food to last us a couple of days - another rookie mistake) and got up to leave when we were startled by the waiter asking us if we wanted him to pack up the remaining food for us. We had never heard of this in India. The idea struck us as bizarre and we declined his offer.
Thus ended our first outing in America. We thought we spoke perfectly decent English, but that was obviously not going to be enough. We would need some serious schooling in American.
6 comments:
Absolutely hilarious!
Must have been a new experience altogether. Hilarious no doubt.
Ha ha ha ha - been there, done that. Have been through similar issues myself. I remember my first trip where my company gave me a few hundred dollar bills and TCs. I was thirsting for a cup of coffee and walked into a nearby starbucks. I could not make head of tail of the various options - latte, cappucino, espresso, etc etc. I asked the lady at the desk - do I get a cup of coffee that is made with dicoction from coffee beans and milk? She gave me a weird look and said, maybe you should try the latte. I placed an order for latte and gave her a hundred dollar bill. She was taken aback. She took it from me, turned it around, shook it a few times (got knows what she thought could be inside a dollar bill) and then game the change - I realized much later that a 100 dollars is a lot of money in the US :)
similarly, the first time I ordered for a pizza - the options made no sense to me at all as I had never had a pizza in India.
I think today's generation may not face such an issue. They are far more aware of many things, better exposed to matters outside of India. But I would definitely cherish my first US experience :)
Brilliantly written. More on this topic please.....!
Good recollection! Sounds like Sridevi in "English Vinglish" movie. A lot of learning but the newer FOBs ("fresh off the boat")are luckier because there are more choices and increasingly aware of what to expect. We were the pioneers!!
Well written with good humour! Yes, I have had a similar experience in McDonald's years ago in the US! We lead a simpler life in Australia with less choices.
All of us can relate to this. It is amazing how under-prepared some guys like me were for our first encounter with the US -inspite of being brought up on Hollywood and bestselling US fiction!
Post a Comment