The American Dream

It’s only been 6 months of me in America and I truly, madly, deeply love it. There’s not one but countless reasons why it’s the most powerful country of the world, and the most loved.

6 months back, when my husband asked and introduced me to the belief of “The American Dream” we were on our way home from the airport. I was jet lagged, drowsy, giddy, cold and inattentive. When I landed at the Newark airport in New Jersey, I was waiting for my 2 gigantic suitcases to arrive so that I could clear my immigration and board my next domestic flight to home. There was a tint of excitement clubbed with a lot of giddiness. While I was sheepishly waiting for the luggage, I saw on the belt a bag was kept in a big plastic basket kindda container with a white powderish thing on it. I thought to my self, “Desi bhi na, Namak is so cheap everywhere, why would someone carry Namak from India, huh!” And then another suitcase came with the white powder on it; another basket came with white powder in it. I was like, no girl, this ain’t salt. And I rubbed my eyes, peeped closer, analyzed clearly, it was snow. I smiled to the foolish me, and welcomed myself to the snowing United States of America. That’s for the heat bound girl of Delhi & Mumbai encountering snow for the first time!

After a few days in the country I was up and about in my life. I had started reading the Driving license material, got a bank account, and basically started settling. After driving the lengths & breadths of India for 10years I accept the Left hand drive was very tough for me. The rules were so many, and everyone obeyed each one so diligently. Why not so, there are fines for every rule you break! Smallest probably is a $20 fine for not wearing seatbelt on the passenger seat, which to the new Indian me was Rs.1,200! So ya, rules are strict and very many if you drive here. But driving here is not something that tires & stresses you. Once you get your hands on it, you will love road trips and traveling.

USA is a very warm country and Americans are the most welcoming people I’ve ever seen. However good, bad, ugly, elite they are, if they cross you, they will smile or greet you or just hold the door open for you. Every car stops on the side, and the whole lane is cleared if there’s an ambulance passing by. Doctors, pharmacists (aka chemists) are so warm and loving that you feel better by just meeting them. Life is valued here. People are treated like they are supposed to be. No one will question you if you break rules, or do something nasty, everyone will mind their own businesses. But because everyone honors the rules, the government, and their country so much!

Once coming back from somewhere in West Virginia, it was late in the night and the country side becomes really dark and lonely here. We were four of us in the car and we stopped at a gas station (aka petrol pump) to refuel. Our friend who was driving got down to fill the gas (apart from few Indian owned petrol pumps in Jersey city, in USA one has to fill the petrol themselves). After finishing he went inside the office, a small brightly lit room, without telling us where is he going. The new-me to this country was worried sick for those few minutes and prayed quietly inside my heart. When he came back, he casually said, “Nothing, the machine required to fill in here, and then take the receipt inside for payments”. I was shell-shocked! Imagine a petrol pump like that in India. How many of us Indians will take the receipt inside to actually pay for the fuel that we have already filled. Honesty is a USA policy and how!

People will keep their cars dirty, but with a $500 littering fine, no one will dare throw the stinking banana peel from their car until there is a proper dustbin. It’s clean and beautiful. People value people. Americans value people.

My husband has been in USA for over 8 years now. It’s amazing how he describes America as a home for anyone in the world. In his school, Masters and office life he’s yet to come across someone who does any kind of discrimination here. All blacks, Asians, desi, gorey, Latinos exist so happily together. If the Native Americans were to protest of outsiders, America would have struggled to bloom. If Americans were to employe only their kith & kin, it would have never become the brain house of the world. It is what it is, because of its people. Every individual who is legally present in America is respected, and given equal opportunities to grow and make the nation grow. People are valued here, that’s why people value people. And these are the people who make USA the most powerful & longed country in the world. That’s the real ‘American dream’ to me. A happily growing state of life. Not just a belief, politically placed in every president’s speech. A way of life that you are entitled to with every Visa stamp, and every citizenship. And I want Indians back home to ape this western culture. To respect every fellow Indian and grow in tandem. Because if the people grow, the nation grows.