#Americaheckyeah

We recently completed a brief trip to the U.S. for a wedding. A great time & the occasion for some observations:

Upon landing at O’Hare on non-stop flight from Delhi, we made a beeline to Frontera Grill for some breakfast. If given the opportunity, I think C would leave me in a heartbeat for Rick—if he promised to share his kitchen with her. Well, he wasn’t there & for now she’s satisfied with my company to enjoy some Rick-Mexican goodness. The taste of good quality Mexican food is a real treat. We just don’t get much variety here. While fans of Indian food, we don’t have much of break from it, even on our own.

We arrive on time to DSM. We promptly and efficiently rent our car & are on the road. Aw, the road, where the few vehicles on the road (“Where is everyone?”) and drivers stay in lanes and drive wonderfully predictably. We get on the ring road on the south side of DM and looking out at the countryside we see the beautiful Grant Wood-style fields. Everything so neat, clean, and orderly. Spring is late, but a hue of green is beginning to frame the countryside. What a joy to be behind the wheel through the lovely countryside—even if it is in a Ford Focus with an automatic transmission. 

We arrive at our first destination: the “Super Target” near Jordan Creek Mall. Entering the store, we find it nearly deserted. “Where is everybody?” “Where are the hordes of people?” Although the store seems short of people, it was full of goods. I think that we in the U.S. are way too consumerist and too enamored with stuff, but it is a gift to go to a store to find all kinds of stuff that you need in a roomy, well-organized, friendly atmosphere. We had a long list of stuff we wanted to purchase, and we were just in luck. Lots of stuff, easy to find. Good quality. Wow. We left a lot lighter in the wallet, but with many of our needs met.

We then went to Cheesecake Factory for lunch (no cheesecake!). Not great, but we could order a salad, and we did, along with some steak tips. Yum. A modest but most welcome salad. We get some more stuff & then head to our digs at the Hotel Fort Des Moines, that venerable old institution from days of Republican political gatherings and basketball tournaments. The room had a radiator, which as it turns out, we needed. The down side of our visit at the beginning was the weather: cold, windy, and rainy. With our current tropical locale, this was a shock to the system but not to the mind. The mind remembers. The room was fine but for the slow internet connection and the fact that the shower heads built for short people, which I can never figure.

Downtown Des Moines seems almost like a ghost town. There are people, but so few! It’s so roomy in this part of America. So easy to walk places: the rain, cold, and wind soon give way to sunshine & warmer temperatures. A small but not insignificant joy.

The wedding is a lovely. Happy couple, seeing lots of relatives. Good times all around. Thanks to good planning, everything runs on time. What a great idea! And the wedding, while lovely, was not an extravaganza, unlike some (most) Indian weddings. Good food, but not acres of it; a celebration for family and friends, but not one for every Tom, Dick, and Hari and their gals. Like a good many things, perhaps the expense of America limits everything, and in this case, for the better.

The only downside of the trip (besides loads of jet lag there and upon return here) was that something in the U.S. didn’t agree with my lower GI tract. I was down for a day with a problem the severity of which has never been matched in my India (or Nepal or Mexico) experience. Well, nothing is perfect, not even the good ol’ US of A.