When you walk out of an airport after flying continuously for more than fifteen hours; you do not exactly look forward to a bus that does not arrive at the appointed hour and promised place. Or, to a phone that fails to resuscitate. Or, to rapidly falling daylight. Or, to find other passengers finding definite means to travel, leaving you to run to every other bus and realise that it does not go to your destination.
All these occurred together as I walked out of Terminal 5 at the Chicago airport. I had been travelling for more than 39 hours! I had started from Bangalore at 1:22 PM on Saturday, to catch the 12:30 AM American Airlines flight departing from Delhi on Sunday. The intended flight got cancelled, and I was accommodated on a later flight to Delhi. At Delhi, the midnight flight got delayed by over twelve hours, and departed only in the afternoon the next day.
A typical day it was proving to be. It was already my birthday in India. It was going to be my birthday in USA in another few hours. A birthday to remember, for sure!
I stood next to the Omega bus sign, holding on to two bags and shifting my weight from one foot to the other. Omega is the last letter in the Greek alphabet. The letter for the last bus which had already gone. The sign advised calling up a certain number. I had a cell phone. I punched the code, read with glee the message, “CODE ACCEPTED”, only to realise moments later that the phone failed to catch any signal. It could as well have been a toy. My watch read seven in the evening. The place was getting deserted. And, none of the buses went to Hyde Park, sorry!
I walked to the taxi stand. It would be about $50 to the Ramada by cab, informed the burly attendant. There goes one third of my daily allowance, I sighed, and signalled the taxi. It was a well maintained vehicle, and I was happy within the security of the automobile.
“You speak like an Indian”, remarked the driver. I told him that I not only spoke like an Indian, I was actually an Indian.
“Where are you coming from?”, came the next question. I replied that I had disembarked from a Delhi flight Delhi, had failed to get the bus, and so was travelling in the taxi.
It was about an hour long drive. The conversation had to continue. The driver informed that he hailed from Islamabad. He came to USA several years ago, initially drove a taxi in Alabama, and for the last four years was settled with family in Chicago.
“A very good place. There is no discrimination. Most of the people you find on the streets of Chicago are immigrants”, he informed. America began as a country of the immigrants, I thought, but did not say anything.
We talked about the Mahatma Gandhi Road in Chicago, places where one could get good Indian food, law and order, blah blah blah. The driver pointed towards Hancock towers on the skyline, McCormick Place, etc., etc., till we finally reached the hotel. The fare was $45, the tip rounded it off to $50, and thus walked I into the hotel at 8 in the evening.
Another day I walked to the taxi stand next to the hotel. The driver was an African. Not the overweight sort, not even the lean and mean types, but a rather frail looking man.
“Will you take me to the Hilton on South Michigan Avenue?”, I asked.
“Yes, I will take you to the Hilton on South Michigan Avenue”, responded the driver.
A very detailed reply, almost like one from the suspense movies!
It was a fifteen minute drive to the Hilton. I paid the fare and gave the tip, and got off the taxi.
The taxi driver on the return trip was one Mr Patel from Mumbai. A postgraduate, he claimed to have faced rather rough weather in USA..
“America ki sarkar jhoothi hai. Sirf dikhawa karti hai. Isko sirf apna matlab nikalna aata hai (The Amercian government is not straight forward. It indulges in pretensions. It only knows how to drive its selfish motives)”, a rather disgruntled Mr Patel ejaculated.
Mr Patel claimed that he was cut for a much better job, but never got the opportunity. There was a lot of discrimination in USA, he said.
“Not only foreigners – this government forgets about its own people also”, informed Mr Patel.
He went off recounting an experience.
It was a lean day. A beggar signalled Mr Patel’s taxi. Obviously, there was no possibility of the beggar being able to pay for the trip. However, it was a lean day. Mr Patel stopped the taxi. The beggar claimed that he was a war veteran, who had to go to a certain office to collect his pension cheque. He assured Mr Patel that the cheque would be encashed within five minutes, and he would have about $1200 to burn. Mr Patel, took a chance, and found the claim to be true. The taxi fare came to $40, but the war veteran paid $100, $60 being the tip! The rest of the money would go on clothes, shoes, party and prostitutes, the war veteran informed. By the end of the month, he would again return to the state of being a beggar!
“Why can’t this government take care of people who fought for it?”, wondered Mr Patel.
Well, if one is bent upon ruining oneself, what can the government do, I thought and got down.
As I walked rather lost on State Street in Chicago one day, confident that bus number 6 would never arrive, I hunted for a taxi. Here he was, with a beard but no moustache, mumbling his prayers. I gave him address, and we started. He was from Pakistan. Karachi, to be precise.
“Zindagi tough hai, lekin Pakistan se to bahut behtar hai (life here is tough, but is much better than that in Pakistan)”, he claimed.
I talked about the repeated failure of Zamhuriyat (democracy). He agreed. I talked about the famous Mr 10% of Pakistan. He said Mr 10% had now become almost Mr 100%. We both agreed that Mia Musharraff was much better than the present rulers. He felt that India was much much better. I too felt the same.
Surprisingly, I never felt any hatred towards any of the Pakistani drivers. No feeling of discomfort, either. They were as human as I was. Two sides of the same coin. I actually felt more comfortable with them than I did with the African drivers!
संदेश
