Finally here!

We landed safe and sound in Des after a very pleasant journey late Monday night.

The see-off at San Francisco by the gang was nothing short of stupendous. I came down from my apartment my mind rambling through a 100 different things. Did I do this, did I do that etc. I actually don't even know who locked that place :P Then I saw it. 6 cars lined up with emergency lights turned on, loading the suitcases. It was then that it hit me. This was a big deal. This move was a big one. All of the gang was at the airport, they drove all that 30 miles and saw us off. I felt immensely sad to leave them, and immensely proud of having had such a close knit circle of friends to see you through everything., and immensely happy that they were all there when we left. All at the same time, so much so, it made me cry. Almost ;)

Subhash's friend Y came to the airport to take us home and he was a good 1.5 hours late in coming thanks to Subhash's superior planning. He had a half an hour buffer built into each process from landing to going home like Immigration, Customs, Baggage claim etc. But not only did the pilot of that Singapore Airlines flight beat his estimate by an hour in landing early, so did all the officers along the way. Immigration, Customs and Baggage claim were all over in half an hour flat. His superior planning came in handy because we could spend time with my parents at least.

A long time ago when I moved to the US, after my first night in Madison, I woke up to the realization that this was no vacation. And I was going to spend a good chunk of time in this place without seeing my home or my parents or my sister or anyone else again for a long long time. And it made my stomach churn. And I didn't want to wake up to that morning. I was wondering if I would feel the same after my first night in Bangalore knowing that this was no vacation. Luckily for me, I didn't feel the same way this time around. Good.