{"id":126,"date":"2005-09-09T14:11:53","date_gmt":"2005-09-09T14:11:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/example.com\/?p=126"},"modified":"2005-09-09T14:11:53","modified_gmt":"2005-09-09T14:11:53","slug":"mum-ams-det-det-det","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/2005\/09\/09\/mum-ams-det-det-det\/","title":{"rendered":"MUM-AMS-DET … DET … DET"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cHave a good one sir\u201d, said Taylor, the pretty security lady at the airport. The good lady directed me to the second of the baggage claim areas for Northwest, which for some crazy reason was next to neverland, behind three other airlines baggage retrieval areas. Call this bad positioning or call this a sadist attempt at being creative in life or simply call it c\u2019giri. The claim area arrangement was like this,
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Gate 1 – Northwest Airlines \u2013 Flight 467<\/strong>
\nGate 2 – Delta Air \u2013 Flight blaah1
\nGate 2b \u2013 Delta Air \u2013 Flight blaah1
\nGate 3 – British Air \u2013 Flight blaah2
\nGate 4 – Blaah Airways \u2013 Flight blaah3
\nGate 5 – Northwest Airlines \u2013 Flight 467 <\/strong> <\/span><\/p>\n

What the f$#$ man!!! After 18 hours of fly-time and 6000+miles added to my frequent flyer program, this!!<\/span><\/p>\n

Oh but we did have some good enjoyable traps with Jack Daniels and Dewar\u2019s White Label pouring thru the flight. It\u2019s funny though how the drinks flow in the aircraft (OR rather how you\u2019re treated when you casually ask for one more peg AND more so when you ask the same steward(ess)). If you\u2019re in normal economy you will be given the cold stare followed by the nod which presumably says Yes (without the Sire). The economy class for a frequent flyer is much better though. This fact, the huge drunkard dude sitting next to me realized in the first 2 hours of flight (\u2026 I didn\u2019t get the stares of course \u2026 I was a FF \u2026 well, except maybe from the odd desi chicks who it seems were looking at a six-footer Indian male in a plane for the first time \u2026 I checked my fly \u2026 all fine \u2026 no kiddin \u2026 they were just very freakin amused \u2026 no funny stuff hanging out anywhere \u2026 I\u2019m generally good in planes and closed claustrophobic areas \u2026 hmm, I can market meself to with these thoughts). <\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, I couldn\u2019t help but stare at a beau meself. She looked like a cross between Jodie Foster and Cameroon Diaz with Jodie\u2019s eyes and Camy\u2019s jaw-line. Fortunately the rest of her attributes were tribute to her ma n (biological) pa, one would think. But anyways, most of us thought she was better looking than the two actresses combined. Now all the ladies in the house would want to know how we collectively came to this conclusion, righto? Well, we have our ways \u2026 it generally ranges from subtle movements in facial expressions to very callous but joyful forms of male expressiveness. <\/span><\/p>\n

Some guys would go \u2026 \u201cwhoaaaaaaaaa meaaaaaan … whaadaa chik man\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While some others would pull a meekly \u201chey man … check her out\u201d, Apoo<\/a> n Me prefer to be dicreet in matters like this and generally don\u2019t raise eyebrows and related body parts. Iyer<\/a>, starts putting his best Sanjeev Kumar face and prepares to burn fuel (after he\u2019s finished checking the guys out first). Bird<\/a> would call for another peg. Alap<\/a>, in the mean time will be coming back to us with the pretty\u2019s number, mother\u2019s maiden name, msn id etc. Fortunately\/Unfortunately for her, on this flight it was only me and a few other dudes who would fall in apoo n bird categories. So the only shots that came about were multiple shots of liquor calls and the subtle stares of course.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ko \u2026 so that was some good hours spent on the airplane going thru MUM-AMS-DET<\/span><\/p>\n

And then came Detroit Airport, where sweetie pie Taylor helped my blind ass get my baggage. Hugs and blessings to you Taylor.<\/span><\/p>\n

Before I even reached the baggage area though, I had to go through the immigration checks which happens to everybody who\u2019s not a US citizen. Apparently, the rest of the world and by that I mean Asians alone and within that the brownies only are conveniently assumed to be terrorists, unless of course you prove otherwise. And so began my scrutiny. They took both index finger prints (left and right of course \u2026 how many more do you think I have) and also took a retinal imprint. <\/span><\/p>\n

Now folks at the counter, I\u2019m not gonna change my hands the next I come to this land. Yea yea, I know the retinal scans stand more for future arrangements, of times when you enter doors on the basis of ur retinal prints \u2026 blah blaahhghoo \u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n

yea dudes \u2026 but common knowledge says this about me (in case you haven\u2019t heard \u2026 it\u2019s even come out in newspapers some say). I\u2019m pitch black blind and I may choose to go for a brand new pair of eyes next week man \u2026 what do you do when I come again to this land and you find out that my finger print crosses against some Scottish drunkard. Would I be penalized? Or asked to go back home or stand in the corner on one leg? Or be asked to replace my old eye and enter? Or show proof that I didn\u2019t kill the Scottish?<\/span><\/p>\n

Yes I\u2019m going too far with this I know (and I was kiddin bout me eyes too \u2026 god forbid that should never happen to me man). Also, for this to come from a techno freak is even bad. But I just wanted to pull one on the officer who interviewed me. This was the funniest conversation I had with a presumed non-techie. <\/span><\/p>\n

Ok now, I\u2019m primarily a functional lead analyst with my company in Mumbai and my purpose of visit stands purely for meetings n discussions over an enterprise wide application. We have to transition a process running here in the US, down to India . In simpler words \u2026 \u201cI\u2019m getting a process down to India \u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And I wanted to make it as simple as possible, but as luck would have it, it ended up being a fun filled tech babble yap \u2026 wait \u2026 not from me \u2026 but from Mr. IthinkIKnowItAll (or IthinkICanSpellDanger) Officer.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll post the exact conversation (in classic conversation mode in the next post \u2026 this one\u2019s getting a bit too long anyways)<\/span><\/p>\n

But after the conversation or interview or scrutiny or whatever the crap that was, I came out (despite the fact that I got my i94 signed) a loser (think I lost weight too) and Mr. IthinkIKnowItAll Officer came out impressed with his assumed astute knowledge of technology. Also, he was so damn impressed by the work I do back home \u2026 mann he went nuts. He showed me out of the immigration area like I was some VIP \u2026 all the way out. I figured he was gay or just simply impressed by his own misinformation on himself. <\/span><\/p>\n

What was good enough to cheer me up after this entire fiasco though was that I was not a terrorist. Only for a brief moment though, after which I reached the confused baggage claim area and all the blah happened there. The rest of the journey went well till I reached gate A21 (after 25 minutes of walking across the airport) for my final flight to Charlotte . Luck had good things in store for me there too \u2026 a part of it was being stuck in the aircraft (yes inside the grounded aircraft) for 5 hours and the plane was not even being hijacked or something \u2026 no fun man.<\/span><\/p>\n

I may choose to write about this 5 hour fiasco too in another post as it seems I\u2019ve run out of ink and wo.d. ma. st.. .lo.i.g h..cef\u2026h<\/span><\/p>\n

All in all, it was an eventful journey, with sweet Taylor , Unnamed hot Blondie, Fat Drunkard, Mr. IWillThinkOfNewSadNamesForYouEverytimeIRemeberThisIncident Officer, my Retina and my Angoota Chaap on electronic machines and of course yes The Smooth Scotch. <\/span><\/p>\n

More gifts for the person who gets the dots in \u201cwo.d. ma. st.. .lo.i.g h..cef\u2026h\u201d filled.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cHave a good one sir\u201d, said Taylor, the pretty security lady at the airport. The good lady directed me to the second of the baggage claim areas for Northwest, which for some crazy reason was next to neverland, behind three other airlines baggage retrieval areas. Call this bad positioning or call this a sadist attempt at being creative in life or simply call it c\u2019giri. The claim area arrangement was like this, Gate 1 – Northwest Airlines \u2013 Flight 467 Gate 2 – Delta Air \u2013 Flight blaah1 Gate 2b \u2013 Delta Air \u2013 Flight blaah1 Gate 3 – British Air \u2013 Flight blaah2 Gate 4 – Blaah Airways \u2013 Flight blaah3 Gate 5 – Northwest Airlines \u2013 Flight 467 What the f$#$ man!!! After 18 hours of fly-time and 6000+miles added to my frequent flyer program, this!! Oh but we did have some good enjoyable traps with Jack Daniels and Dewar\u2019s White Label pouring thru the flight. It\u2019s funny though how the drinks flow in the aircraft (OR rather how you\u2019re treated when you casually ask for one more peg AND more so when you ask the same steward(ess)). If you\u2019re in normal economy you will be given the cold stare followed by the nod which presumably says Yes (without the Sire). The economy class for a frequent flyer is much better though. This fact, the huge drunkard dude sitting next to me realized in the first 2 hours of flight (\u2026 I didn\u2019t get the stares of course \u2026 I was a FF \u2026 well, except maybe from the odd desi chicks who it seems were looking at a six-footer Indian male in a plane for the first time \u2026 I checked my fly \u2026 all fine \u2026 no kiddin \u2026 they were just very freakin amused \u2026 no funny stuff hanging out anywhere \u2026 I\u2019m generally good in planes and closed claustrophobic areas \u2026 hmm, I can market meself to with these thoughts). Of course, I couldn\u2019t help but stare at a beau meself. She looked like a cross between Jodie Foster and Cameroon Diaz with Jodie\u2019s eyes and Camy\u2019s jaw-line. Fortunately the rest of her attributes were tribute to her ma n (biological) pa, one would think. But anyways, most of us thought she was better looking than the two actresses combined. Now all the ladies in the house would want to know how we collectively came to this conclusion, righto? Well, we have our ways \u2026 it generally ranges from subtle movements in facial expressions to very callous but joyful forms of male expressiveness. Some guys would go \u2026 \u201cwhoaaaaaaaaa meaaaaaan … whaadaa chik man\u201d While some others would pull a meekly \u201chey man … check her out\u201d, Apoo n Me prefer to be dicreet in matters like this and generally don\u2019t raise eyebrows and related body parts. Iyer, starts putting his best Sanjeev Kumar face and prepares to burn fuel (after he\u2019s finished checking the guys out first). Bird would call for another peg. Alap, in the mean time will be coming back to us with the pretty\u2019s number, mother\u2019s maiden name, msn id etc. Fortunately\/Unfortunately for her, on this flight it was only me and a few other dudes who would fall in apoo n bird categories. So the only shots that came about were multiple shots of liquor calls and the subtle stares of course. Ko \u2026 so that was some good hours spent on the airplane going thru MUM-AMS-DET And then came Detroit Airport, where sweetie pie Taylor helped my blind ass get my baggage. Hugs and blessings to you Taylor. Before I even reached the baggage area though, I had to go through the immigration checks which happens to everybody who\u2019s not a US citizen. Apparently, the rest of the world and by that I mean Asians alone and within that the brownies only are conveniently assumed to be terrorists, unless of course you prove otherwise. And so began my scrutiny. They took both index finger prints (left and right of course \u2026 how many more do you think I have) and also took a retinal imprint. Now folks at the counter, I\u2019m not gonna change my hands the next I come to this land. Yea yea, I know the retinal scans stand more for future arrangements, of times when you enter doors on the basis of ur retinal prints \u2026 blah blaahhghoo \u2026 yea dudes \u2026 but common knowledge says this about me (in case you haven\u2019t heard \u2026 it\u2019s even come out in newspapers some say). I\u2019m pitch black blind and I may choose to go for a brand new pair of eyes next week man \u2026 what do you do when I come again to this land and you find out that my finger print crosses against some Scottish drunkard. Would I be penalized? Or asked to go back home or stand in the corner on one leg? Or be asked to replace my old eye and enter? Or show proof that I didn\u2019t kill the Scottish? Yes I\u2019m going too far with this I know (and I was kiddin bout me eyes too \u2026 god forbid that should never happen to me man). Also, for this to come from a techno freak is even bad. But I just wanted to pull one on the officer who interviewed me. This was the funniest conversation I had with a presumed non-techie. Ok now, I\u2019m primarily a functional lead analyst with my company in Mumbai and my purpose of visit stands purely for meetings n discussions over an enterprise wide application. We have to transition a process running here in the US, down to India . In simpler words \u2026 \u201cI\u2019m getting a process down to India \u201d And I wanted to make it as simple as possible, but as luck would have it, it ended up being a fun filled tech babble yap \u2026 wait \u2026 not from me \u2026 but from Mr. IthinkIKnowItAll (or IthinkICanSpellDanger) Officer. I\u2019ll post the exact conversation (in classic conversation mode in the next post \u2026 this one\u2019s getting a bit too long anyways) But after the conversation or interview or scrutiny or whatever the crap that was, I came out (despite the fact that I got my i94 signed) a loser (think I lost weight too) and Mr. IthinkIKnowItAll Officer came out impressed with his assumed astute knowledge of technology. Also, he was so damn impressed by the work I do back home \u2026 mann he went nuts. He showed me out of the immigration area like I was some VIP \u2026 all the way out. I figured he was gay or just simply impressed by his own misinformation on himself. What was good enough to cheer me up after this entire fiasco though was that I was not a terrorist. Only for a brief moment though, after which I reached the confused baggage claim area and all the blah happened there. The rest of the journey went well till I reached gate A21 (after 25 minutes of walking across the airport) for my final flight to Charlotte . Luck had good things in store for me there too \u2026 a part of it was being stuck in the aircraft (yes inside the grounded aircraft) for 5 hours and the plane was not even being hijacked or something \u2026 no fun man. I may choose to write about this 5 hour fiasco too in another post as it seems I\u2019ve run out of ink and wo.d. ma. st.. .lo.i.g h..cef\u2026h All in all, it was an eventful journey, with sweet Taylor , Unnamed hot Blondie, Fat Drunkard, Mr. IWillThinkOfNewSadNamesForYouEverytimeIRemeberThisIncident Officer, my Retina and my Angoota Chaap on electronic machines and of course yes The Smooth Scotch. More gifts for the person who gets the dots in \u201cwo.d. ma. st.. .lo.i.g h..cef\u2026h\u201d filled.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/statueofpuberty.com\/sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}