1. Do you encounter any racism there? Are muggings in dark alleys common? Are you affected by the gun culture? ARe you subject to long to long rudestares, physical intimidation, stiffled giggles as you walk past by?

     The racism here is very subtle bu certainly there. There are such vast differences in our mental make-up because of the completely different ways we have been brought up compared to the Americans that they feel us to be strange creatures. This is inspite of the facct that there are just Indians and Indians at every nook and corner of the US. For eg. in Chicago and its suburbs alone there aer 60,000 Indians. However the interactions between the Indians and the Americans are for the most part on a superficial and formal level. This is not to say that friendships between an Indian and American guy cannot develop but they are the exception rather than the norm. So, in the matter of racisn, there are no crude devices like throwing racial slurs at you or calling out rude names on streets, bu there definitely is absence of the custmary courtesies at sevice places, the lact of the smile, the conscious effort to keep a distance, not to play with Indians, etc. I just said that crude racism is not there, but towards middle of the fall semester here (in Oct) there was just such an incident involving an American group of and 3 Indian girls when abuses were hurled at them and a beer bottle was thrown at one of the girls. It turned out that this same group had been harassing some international students previously too but the authorities had not taken any stern steps to dissuade them. After this last incident, protest marches were organised an the Indian community wore black arm bands and sumbitted resolutions to the Dean, etc. But since then the matter has died down and nothing more has been heard of it.

2. Do you have any communication problems on account of accent?

     Well, this was a big put down for quite some time here. Because i thought that i knew English well as anybody and when people stared at me with total bewilderment as if i was speaking Swahili or something., it ws quite damaging to my confidence. The American accent i gegan to follow soon enough, through even now when they speak especially fast or i am talking to someone with a Texan twang or a southern accent, i have to say "Whats that" a few times. However it is quite obviously proving much harder for the Americans to understand me. Unconsciously, but now quite perceptibly, i have changed my accent, especially when i am talking to the Americans. Apart from accent, the English they speak here is quite different from what i had been used to. They show a remarkable ingnorance of English words extending beyond two syllables and i am speaking even of highly educated people, eg. profs in our dept. Also the accent of the blacks and the whites is so totally different that you can tell them apart with 100% centainity. Also it is customary to call things "cool" or shout out that this or that "sucks" or to say that this or that is "crappy" and to use "... or something" to convey your emotion when you are not sure of what you are saying or want to take the easy way out instead of going into detailed description of anything. At the present, a big debate is raging in America about "Ebonics" which is the formal name given to the language as spoken by the blacks. One group of educators want to teach black kids in Ebonics while the other group feels that it is just an excuse to get away with flagrant violations of th most basic English grammar and spelling rules.

3. Is socialism inevitable or you can staay aloof if you desire?

     Well, we all feel the need to socialise very much but being Indians this is always an uphill task. I had landed here with grand visions of being in a cinvivial group with blondes. But those visions vaporised quickly. I have a feeling (and since we Indians, called "desis" here, discuss such things often at length, i know that most others concur with me) that the Americans, at least some of them, look upon as some sort of uncivilised people from a different planet altogether. This is extremely sad but the unfortunate fact. I have come to know a few Americans in my research group and an American family and the sorts of misconceptions about India i have had to clear. For eg. they asked me "Did you get two square meals a day?", "How many times did you lose all your belongings in flood or drought?", "Is there gunfight going on in the streets of your cities?" and one particular ignorant chap "Do you burn your women when their husbands die?" Well i put the blame on us too. Because all the images of India that get portrayed in the western media (and believe my there is very little of that) is of India as it existed in historical times. India of the kings and queens, India of palaces and palanquins, India of dark intrigues and coups. The fact that India is now a major scientific power with all the benefits (most of it at least) of modern science and technology is not shown at all. Gandhi is the all - pervasive image whenever India comes up. And the few images of India I have seen in the electronic media here has been India of dusty villages of kothas, of concubines. So, in the matter of socialising there is far too little of it and there is an understandable tendency for the desis to stick together. A large percentage of the Indians here are second generation Indians whose parents came here and then they were born and brought up here. As a result they have the most tenuous of links of India, nerver speak Hindi or their mother tongue (or even if they do, do so with an atrocious accent) and are lampooned by us as "ABCD"s (American Born Confused Desis). Interestingly they also have an acronym for us ehich is an exact paliandrome: "DCBA"s (Desis Confused by Americans). Anyway , we feel no affinity towards there ABCD kins and feel mixed pity (because they are neither here nor there and are lost) and irritation (at their phoney mannerisms and airs) at them. These ABCDs are better at socialising with American folks.

4. Do you have problems eating outside or you cook your food yourself? What about pure vegetarians?

     We cook ourselves at home. We take turns in cooking. Each of us cooks twice a week and eat out one day. We cook at night and that food lasts us for that night's dinner and next day's lunch, for those of us who get the time to get back home from office for lunch. Eating ou is a little bit of a problem for the vegetarians (like me). The people here eat beef like there's no tommorrow. At McDonald's and such other fast food places it's very difficult to get something that doesn't have meat in it. Beef is really cheap here and they put beef in every conceivable dish, like egg rolls! Pizza is a big favorite of students and they do have pizzas with veggie toppings. Pizza places have delivery services and whn i am working late into the night at my office, i order pizzas over. For the exam week i gorged myself on pizzas with the resultant 10 pounds of weight gain. It's very easy to put on weight here as they have such delectable chocolates, ice creams at very low prices but bulging with fat and saturated fat. Here on every food item by the orders of the central food administration, they have got to write the components of fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, carbohydrates, dietary fibre, etc. etc. in punds and I am 170., up 5 pounds since the time i left home.