This time I arrived in San Francisco, from where I took the bus to San Luis Obispo. The classes were to start soon. Passing through San Jose, Salinas, the Steinbeck country, Paso Robles, Atascadero etc. I could see the scrub oaks and pastures full of cows until we came to the hills of San Luis Obispo.
The oil rigs in the northern part bobbed up and down everywhere and the wide highway full of speeding vehicles reminded you that you are in the United States where almost everyone drives a car.
You also noticed the Howard Johnson or KFC signs everywhere. People here gobbled up fast food as if it was the only thing to do. Everyone seemed to be in a hurry going somewhere. There were huge trucks with trailers loaded with new cars for delivery, but every town had a used car lot.
I had arrived in the United States at a crucial time when the entire country was going through soul-searching for answers to the war in Vietnam. There were massive protests all over the country against the war, and the pro and anti-war protesters often clashed, with dire consequences. Many young people fled to Canada or elsewhere to avoid the compulsory draft, and some went to jail in protest.
But the mood of the government was ugly. It kept up the pressure on Vietnam by increasing the bombings that now included Cambodia while negotiating for peace in Paris, but peace was still many years away. Almost everyone had an opinion pro or con on the issue.
I stayed out of controversy, although some people knew that I had just come from Vietnam and knew first hand the situation there.
My roommate was from Oklahoma who was a nice chap and chased girls all the time when they were not chasing him. The infernal telephone rang sans cesse because his numerous girlfriends would not leave him alone.
At last, I was once again a graduate student after that hopeless stint at the College in India. I wish the arrogant principal of the College could see me now, but I did not gloat. I had long hard studies ahead of me, but my professors and adviser were really great. They helped me out with my study plan and gave me a lot of valuable advice.
Here, the graduate students were mostly left alone to decide what they wanted to study, although they assigned a professor to guide you. I made steady progress towards a MS degree, but the only problem now was money. I did not have enough to cover all my expenses, so I took a part-time job in the cafeteria cleaning tables and later a night job cleaning classrooms.
I also tried my hands as a short order cook and a tire repair man but did not last long. The night job earned me just enough to pay for some expenses.
The dormitory was fun, but at times the fun got out of hand, like the time my roommate was seen collecting pennies, although I would not say what for. We were to soon find out. He was a very naughty fellow and always up to some mischief.
Our dorm had so-called towers because it had a unique architecture. It was built on a mountain slope, so all the towers were at various levels. We were in tower 7. The next day the tower 8 boys were frantically banging on their doors that they could not open from inside and all got locked in.
Soon the manager was called for help, who trotted up to find pennies wedged between the door and the jamb so no one could turn the knob. It took a long time to pry out the pennies one by one and let people out, some of whom were late for exams or other classes. They were indeed very furious and started to hunt for the culprit. It did not take them long to find out.
I came back to find that the reprisal was swift. Our room was full of shaving cream that stank for weeks even after cleaning up. Not only had they identified my roommate who had wedged the pennies, they thought I was in it too. It was useless to say that I was innocent, although I did give some pennies.
I had never seen such a terrible mess. When I wondered how they had gotten into our locked room, someone explained that they did not have to. All they needed was a paper bag full of shaving cream, stick it under the door and bang the bag. That did the job and did it well.
Then there was a fellow who had the habit of singing aloud with his microphone that disturbed everybody. This fellow was very afraid of tarantulas. Sure enough one day some big nasty looking tarantulas were found in his bed that freaked the fellow out. The hills behind the dorm were full of them. This time the culprit was not found, but my roommate had a knowing smile on his face.
I was getting used to the American campus and especially the dorm life. All kinds of pranks were the order of the day here. One half of the dorm was for the girls and there was a common lounge, but the visiting hours were lax.
Then there were the nights when boys raided the panties of girls. I was amazed to see the girls dangling their underwear and boys chasing to get them. Whatever made them do such foolish things was beyond me, but I was told that these were college traditions here.
One night there was a water balloon fight. We filled up balloons with water and dropped them on unsuspecting people below from our windows. They even drenched the security police one night with a hose. The engineering students were probably the most mischievous. When one student asked them how to make a blinking light in his window, they advised him to put a penny in the socket and then put the bulb on. Soon the entire dorm plunged into darkness that led to more mischief.
The dorm organized many parties when students munched pop corn, danced or watched movies. I usually stood aside awkwardly because I did not feel comfortable dancing with girls, but a freshman called Debbie took it upon herself to teach me some lessons. Here holding hands or kissing was common, and I will not go into details about what else they did, but this sort of thing was common in a mixed dorm like ours. The manager was an old woman with owl rim glasses and dangling chains who ignored most of the shenanigans until things got out of hand once in a while.
In our dorm lived a Vietnamese girl I will call Tuyen who was small like most Vietnamese girls but cute. She said that she was from Can Tho, where she had lived near the IVS office. We became friends, and often we went to a Chinese restaurant and talked endlessly about what I can not recall, amid the tremendous din the Chinese made. I never understood why the Chinese restaurants were so noisy and why they had to shout to order food.
Anyway, Tuyen and I were often seen together because we could not escape unnoticed from our dorm. There were always some students sitting on the front porch brushing their hair or just sitting and noticing everything, especially when two people were seen together more than once. This led to gossip among them, but we ignored it.
Another thing was that the Americans went on dates in blue jeans and tee shirts, but Tuyen and I always put on our best clothes. This was a spectacle they never missed, and often we could hear their comments. Nevertheless, Tuyen was pleasant company and I think she enjoyed talking to me as much as I enjoyed her company, but one day she said that she had a boyfriend all along. I did not know this, so I stopped abruptly. I am sure the hair brushing students noticed, but making and breaking was nothing unusual on an American campus. It happened all the time.
Many years later Tuyen would flee Vietnam and pass through the refugee center in the Philippines on her way to the United States again where she would be granted residency, marry her boyfriend and live somewhere in California. I have lost contact with her.
In the dorm, I had no less than 3 roommates in one year. The Oklahoman moved out one day when he declared that he was getting married. Now I had known his love affairs a bit, but he really surprised me by that announcement because he was marrying a girl he had met a week earlier.
The second fellow used to sit with his feet into a hot bath every night wearing some sort of welder’s goggles, holding an arc lamp to his eyes. When I asked what it was all about, he said it helped clear his brain, which I believe was foggy most of the time.
During Christmas of 1969 the dorm was vacated so all the American students went home and the foreign students like me were sent to foster homes in various places. I was sent to stay with a kind lady in Lompoc who also took me to Santa Barbara. There I joined a group singing carols and “we shall overcome” protesting the injustices and war peacefully. I saw the anguish of parents whose sons had become hippies in protest.
The Cal Poly campus was considered a conservative campus where aggies in Stetson and blue denims and cowboy boots menaced anyone with long hair or protesting the war, but one day I wore a black armband that students were passing out and got a lot of nasty stares. I was an aggie, so what was I doing wearing the armband? I often spoke about the war in churches where old women would listen to me very attentively and pressed on some coins in my hands to my utter embarrassment. I was not doing it for money.
During the Thanksgiving holidays, I was surprised when an American came out of his house and invited me to dinner, proving that there were many kind and generous people in this country. The children were absolutely charming, and they loved my story telling. I got on well with kids in any country except perhaps Algeria, but I will tell you about them later.
Now the time had come for me to find a cheaper place to live, so a friend of mine found me a room in the Wesley House just off campus.
But Wesley house was not any better. It was cheap living, but I never got to know any of the 9 Americans who lived there. They were small town boys who did not show any curiosity about me. One of them asked what I was listening to on my shortwave radio. It was BBC, but he had never heard of it, so I said I could also get VOA and many other stations. He had never heard of VOA either. The only radio they knew was the AM/FM radio that people had in their cars. These were college students.
At first, my roommate seemed like a nice fellow who liked to walk with me in the moonlight and chatter, but one day he fell off his bunk bed on my study desk and shattered the beautiful porcelain eagle that I had received as a gift from someone in Hong Kong. Only then I came to know that he was on drugs and had other mental problems.
Luckily he moved out, but in came another weird fellow who one night insisted on bringing me up to a mountain top in his jalopy to show me the lights of San Luis Obispo. I was really annoyed because it was 2 am and the lights of San Luis Obispo were nothing to rave about.
I found them to be very mediocre and strange, but I had my night job and daytime studies, so I was very busy or tired to mind them. I painted the house, fixed the lawn and even found an old carpet for the living room, but they did not care and often cleaned their motorbikes on the carpet.
The stupid telephone constantly rang, and it was always girls because between them, they must have had a platoon of girls chasing them.
They would bring in dogs who felt free to chew up my brand new and expensive boots. In short, I did not enjoy staying there a bit and was biding my time when I would graduate and leave.
I did not have many friends after Tuyen and I parted ways. My Vietnamese friends lived far from the campus, so I rarely saw them. Then in one of my classes I met Alice, who had very blond hair and brown eyes. She was very friendly and said that she liked me a great deal. I came to appreciate her as she was always ready to come to my aid whenever I needed it.
Once we went on a field trip to Yosemite National Park. Americans pronounce it Yosemiti I do not know why. Anyway, Alice and I became good friends and talked about Oh I do not know what. She would show up at 2 am to pick me up and bring me to the Greyhound bus station when I could have taken a taxi easily, but she said that she liked to. We had a lot in common. We were both outgoing and curious about the world.
I was at this time invited to speak to a distinguished gathering of scientists in Cape Cod, Massachusetts where the topic was the abuse of defoliants and its effect on people in Vietnam because I had some first-hand knowledge of the 2,4,5-T called Agent Orange. The Americans sprayed it on the rubber plantations in Tay Ninh to flush out the Vietcong. The spray often drifted onto banana plantations and killed the plants.
I showed some slides and spoke about how devastating the effect of defoliation was in Vietnam. Others spoke about its effect on soil poisoning and mixing with the food chain that led to deformed babies or abortion. I met some very prominent scientists there and one of them, a Cambridge professor, kept contact with me for over thirty years.
Then in December, the executive director of the IVS in Washington DC asked if I would join him at a conference of voluntary organizations in Varna, Bulgaria, so I took some time off from my studies and went to Bulgaria. Alice was very impressed and brought me to the bus station.
My Bulgaria trip got off almost on a wrong footing when someone put my luggage on the belt bound for London. The poor Pan Am agent ran to retrieve it and put the correct tags. A disaster was thus avoided, and I was on my way to Paris, where I stayed a few days before going to Sofia. The airport in Sofia was practically deserted when I arrived one evening, but I waited because I was told that someone will receive me and fix me up somewhere for the night, so I waited what seemed like a long time.
Finally, a girl arrived and said that I must wait some more because she had some other business to take care of and will return soon, but she did not. So I took a taxi and asked to be brought to the Tourist Bureau. It was late at night, but they were open and friendly. They asked if I wanted a hotel room or a private home. I opted for a private home, so they gave me a chit of paper and told the driver to bring me there.
The driver finally found the house in question in a narrow lane, but the lady of the house first wanted the chit of paper before she would open the door an inch. After these formalities I was shown to a room where a wood burning stove stood in one corner giving some heat and not much else. Although the language was a problem, I tried to break the ice by trying to explain that I was going to Varna etc. but they remained impassive.
Finally, I had an idea. I pulled out some slides of New York and showed them with a view finder. They were truly amazed. Remember, this was 1970 and Bulgaria was a virtually closed country at that time. I was lucky to get a visa to visit the hermit kingdom. Anyway, the hunger pangs started to hit me, but the lady made it clear that the agreement was just for a bed, so I ventured out in the cold, dreary night of Sofia looking for a restaurant.
The wide boulevards were empty, and I saw no sign of any restaurant, although I had some basic knowledge of the Russian alphabet and could read signboards. I had no luck, so I wandered for quite some time until I saw a place where people were eating, so I went in and ordered some food.
Soon I was surrounded by the noisy Bulgarians who wanted to talk to me and know where I was from etc. just like in Kyoto. I explained as best as I could, but the conversation was not going anywhere with pantomime. Soon a plate of omelet, thick slices of bread and a huge bowl of yogurt arrived.
The bread was a bit rough, but I was not about to complain, so I chewed as best as I could. Soon more bread and omelet arrived, but I had enough and wanted to pay and get out. Now I was in for a great surprise. They told me that it was not a restaurant at all but a canteen for the factory worker and the food was mostly free. I was very embarrassed and wanted to pay and get out quickly, but they were having a great time and would not let me go. They did not accept any payment and kept on asking me all sorts of questions. Some offered me their foul smelling cigarette, but I declined and finally extricated myself from that mess.
The next day I found a crowd at the airport all going to Varna to attend the same meeting, but the snow was heavy, and the runway coated with it, so the Varna flight was cancelled. There were many nationalities. The Italians had obviously come well-prepared for the cold weather judging from the bulge in their great coats from which they imbibed liberally and offered me to partake as well. Finally, it was announced that a flight to a place called Turgovische or something like that was leaving, so we could all take it and take a bus from there to Varna.
This was good news, so we all got on before they could change their mind or the weather got worse. This was no time to be choosy, although the propellers reminded me of that awful plane from Sri Ram Pur to Kolkata long ago. It was cramped, and the fat Bulgarian stewardess kept on bumping my shoulder with her behind, which was doubly annoying. She passed on some tough candy that tore up my mouth, but at least we were going someplace.
Now in Targoviste which was a very small airport we looked in vain for something to eat and raided the small cafeteria that had nothing, so a fellow was sent on a bicycle to fetch some bread and cheese and some wine.
My companion and seatmate was a six-foot tall German girl called Heidi who shared some food with me, but it was not enough.
The Italians drank their dinner, but the problem now was how to get to Varna. This problem was solved when a lone rickety bus made of wood and belching smoke showed up.
A crowd of farmers or town folks was waiting for this bus for a long time, but they were told that the foreigners had the priority and would get on first. They did not like this one bit, and I am glad I did not understand their language to know what they were saying. I am sure it was not praised. Not knowing a language can sometimes come in handy. Anyway, the bus that was shaped more like a boat than a bus took off through the country road.
Now, the Bulgarian bus is unlike any other bus I have ever been on. I mean, I did not mind the hard seats and the poor shock absorbers, but they continuously played some sort of martial music that began to grate on my nerves and nearly empty stomach. So I looked outside the window to notice the peasants working, chicken free foraging and all manners of farm equipment, tractors, trailers, carts, horses etc. The buildings were sturdy and farms large. Obviously, we were passing through a very agricultural area. The road was narrow, and the driver was a bit too fast for my liking, but we finally arrived in Varna in one piece, which was good.
Varna is on the Black Sea and a beautiful resort city. It was modern and had interesting architectural designs, although I admit I am no expert in designs.
The beach is proudly called by the Bulgarians Zlatni Piasatzi or the golden sands. The town looked empty, this being not the tourist season. We were lodged in a nice hotel right near the beach. One could see many ships with Russian markings, reminding you that you were in their backwaters. North of Varna was the border of Romania, and Odessa was not too far. I had studied my geography well.
The meetings were endless where everyone wanted to make a speech as if speech making was going out of style. At the end of the meeting, the Bulgarians hosted a grand champagne party and a high ranking official came to address the gathering. I was very impressed when after a long speech, a Bulgarian interpreter translated it verbatim without notes. Afterward, there was dancing and a lot of champagne, but no one danced with poor Heidi. She was over six feet tall, but I did not mind. She was only 4 inches taller.
There was one evening when we were invited to the ballet downtown that was very well done. One woman tersely asked me not to take photos, but on the whole the Bulgarians were a formidable host and did everything possible to make our stay enjoyable. An excellent pianist played during dinner and the food was very good.
I was ready to leave after the delightful stay in Varna, but an unexpected problem arose. There was a cholera outbreak in Turkey, so all the flights to Istanbul were cancelled, stranding me in Bulgaria. The Pan Am New York did not respond to many telexes I sent to reroute me, so someone suggested that I take the train to Istanbul.
There was another surprise waiting for me at the hotel but a pleasant one this time. They said that my bill was paid by the Government because I was a state guest. The Bulgarians also enjoyed such privileges in India, so I thanked my Indian passport silently and asked the driver to bring me to the airport. He ignored all the red lights as we were a bit late already, but I found out that I had left my coat in the hotel.
So the poor chap made a rapid U-turn to fetch the lousy coat and brought me to the airport up to the plane that had already started the engines. A frantic waving of hands and rapid fire Bulgarian worked miracles, and the pilot opened the hatch to let me in. But my troubles were not over yet, so read on.
In Sofia, I went to the train station and asked the help of a Polish fellow from Poznan to find me a ticket and a sleeping berth on the night train. Now, some kids saw me with a camera and asked me to take their photo and insisted on taking my photo as well, so they grabbed the camera from my hand. They were a bit overly playful, but the result was that they dropped my camera on the cobblestone and soon disappeared to my dismay.
In Sofia, I went to see the famous cathedral where long robed monks were singing in a delightful way that echoed in the high vaulted dome, but the basement was full of marvelous religious paintings of Madonna with baby Jesus and various other themes. I saw icons there that were hundreds of years old and most wonderful. There were crucifixes and chalices as well.
The train left promptly at 9 PM bound for Istanbul and I found my seat. So far so good, but the night was not over yet. At around midnight, we had crossed the border to the Turkish side when two policemen knocked on the door and asked to see my visa. But I did not have a visa, which made them nasty, and they asked me to get off at the next stop and go back to Bulgaria to get one. I looked outside and saw a dim kerosene lamp flickering at a lone, empty station, so I decided that I was not going to get off that train unless they threw me off like Gandhi.
When the policemen saw my resolve, they changed their tune and said that they could give me a visa for twenty dollars worth of Turkish liras. This was, however, easier said than done because no one gave me liras in exchange for my traveler’s checks on that train, although I knocked on every door pleading. Finally, I returned to my seat and locked the door from inside, so the policemen could not bother me again that night.
The next morning there was a knock on the door again, but this time it was a different policeman. I explained that his colleagues were really nasty, although I thought the Turkish people were really very nice and he himself looked like a nice chap. A little bit of buttering works miracles at times.
He apologized and said that he would give me a visa for three dollars, but he could only take Liras. I then came up with the idea that I could pay at the airport because it all goes to the same treasury, right? He agreed and stamped my passport.
At the airport in Istanbul, I vented my frustrations at the Pan Am agent and said that it was their responsibility to look after their passengers and did a very poor job of it. He said that he will try his best to put me on a flight to Delhi and called me later to inform me that a seat had been found on the flight to Beirut, from where I will connect to a BOAC flight to Delhi.
At that point I was willing to be routed through Timbuktu if that helped, so I went to Beirut. But my ordeal was not over yet. In Beirut, they put me up in a hotel by the sea front but forgot to pick me up for the flight. I called many times to no avail. Finally, a taxi man showed up and said that he had trouble finding me because the airline gave him the name of the wrong hotel, so I had to hurry up because we were late.
When I arrived at the airport, I found the place empty and no agent anywhere, so I pounded on their door to get some attention. Finally, a fellow emerged and said that I was too late. The flight had been closed and taxiing out. This was absolutely the last straw. I had gone through a lot of trouble to get here, and it was not my fault that I was not picked up on time.
I asked the agent to call the tower and the tower to the pilot, who was still on the runway. Maybe he will open the hatch and take me onboard. The chances were slim, but I had to try. It turned out that the pilot was in a good mood and decided to take me on board. So the hatch opened, stairs brought in and I got on.
Remember that those were the days before the three-hour check in and endless body searches. Now try to get on a flight that has left the parking lot, and you will know what I mean.
Then we sat on the runway for an hour. The reason was that there were more than 50 unaccompanied kids on that plane and one kid was missing. The pilot absolutely refused to take off until the kid was located, so a tedious process of roll call began. The kid was later found. He was just being a kid and having a bit of fun playing hide and seek.
I of course went to Sri Ram Pur and after a few weeks there decided to stop by Manila and Los Baños again to see if some of my friends were still there. I found that many had graduated and left Los Baños, but Teresita was still there, and it was she who took me to Lucent to look for Nellie de Guzman. There the trail led to Manila, where Nellie lived in a place called Gagalangin Tondo. This place is notorious for crimes and thievery, but I went anyway.
Nellie was very surprised to see me, but we went to ride in the bus that the tourists took to see the famous sunset in the Manila Bay and while we were enjoying the sunset, she said that she was engaged to be married to a Moslem fellow from Mindanao. The sunset looked so ordinary after that. I do not know why I was so upset. She was definitely not my girlfriend, so why was I upset? I do not know. But I do know that nothing was the same afterward, and I soon left for Hong Kong on my way back to the United States.
However, something very interesting happened while I was in Los Baños this time. One day I was talking to a scientist at IRRI who seemed to be very interested in what I did in Vietnam when the deputy director general walked in. I was introduced, so he asked a few questions and was about to leave when I blurted out that I liked IRRI very much and would someday like to come back here to learn about rice research given half a chance. Could he by any means consider me for a scholarship?
He was a real gentleman and said that the first thing to do was to apply and then IRRI will decide whether I qualified and even brought me an application form. I thanked him and took the form with a promise to send it to him with supporting documents later. This would in the distant future develop into an extraordinary story that I will write about soon.
So I returned to San Luis Obispo after spending a few nights in Hong Kong. I went to Macau by boat from Hong Kong, but the Portuguese officers there would not let me off the boat. India had taken over their colonies of Goa, Daman and Dieu, so I was the victim of this geopolitics.
I had just made my second round the world trip, not in 80 days but just as adventurous as that of David Niven, but now the time had come for me to write my thesis and finish up the graduate studies at Cal Poly.
My professor and adviser was a very kind and helpful person who gave me a lot of help, his labs to work in and his instruments to draw my illustrations so one day in June I graduated, wore my toga to listen to S.I.Hayakawa who made a long and boring speech.
At this time, wonderful news came from IRRI that took me completely by surprise. They offered me a one-year full scholarship to do rice research there and said in their letter that they had found my qualifications very good.
But I had by this time committed myself to go to Algeria for two years as a volunteer agronomist with the IVS so I could not accept the IRRI offer. They were very gracious and said that if I was interested in the future to go there, then I should at that time re apply, and they will reconsider my case.
The Cal Poly chapter was closing, but not before I mentioned that there were many who helped me. Friends like Alice, Tuyen and my professors made it worth the hard work that was required to graduate. Dr. Fisher had not forgotten me and inquired about me from time to time. He was a very kind person.
There were many joyous occasions like the Poly Royal carnival, various concerts, music bands, football games, kite flying, Christmas parties in Lompoc, with my foster families in town and later in Atascadero, the trip to Rosamond in the Mojave Desert, up the highway to Big Sur, San Simeon and the Hearst castle etc. The rodeo games and the county fairs were fascinating and truly American.
Alice one day brought me to the bus station at night, and we said goodbye, never to see each other again. She would later get married to a forester and live somewhere in California. Her gift of a Native American charm with a strand of her golden hair tied to it to ward off evil still decorates our home, although sweet Alice has disappeared forever from my life. I do miss her.
The long road to Washington state was tedious, but I wanted to see Lauren and Roger there before leaving the West Coast for good. She now had a baby called John, and Roger was still trying hard to get into the Veterinary school. It was really good to see them. I recall the time we spent on Mt. Hood last spring throwing snowballs at each other and having such a good time. We reminisced a lot about Vietnam and our mutual friends.
They had visited with my family back in Sri Ram Pur and I had visited the mother of Roger in Connecticut. Now I was going away not knowing when or if I will ever see them again. They were very good people and good friends.
Now I had to go back to Washington, D.C. where they had arranged for me to take intensive lessons in French. I needed to speak French in Algeria. The old friend Hubert was waiting for me in Washington and gave me a tight hug. Remember Hubert of Ba Xuyen who lived like a pig? He had fixed me up to stay at a dormitory near Dupont Circle and take my lessons at the Sanz language school downtown.
The Sanz language school in downtown Washington was a shabby place where they gave me a very cold room and a blackboard. There I met a very beautiful and young girl waiting for me. She was obviously French and spoke English in a lilting French accent that bowled me over right away.
She said that she was Nicole Gautier, and I was her only student, and she expected me to learn to speak French in two months’ time. I said that I was an old goat and learning a tough language like French was a bit too much to expect, but she smiled and said we will see. She was determined to make me learn the language.
So we started the routine of je vais, tu vas, Il va etc. and the difficult French grammar and conjugation. The rules were so complicated. I soon started getting into French because after 8 hours a day, 6 days a week one had little choice in the matter. She had said that I will speak French or her name is not Nicole. But another matter soon came up. I was getting a bit tired of the Sanz because the air conditioner malfunctioned. One day I asked her how much Sanz was paying her per hour, to which she was reluctant to reply, but I insisted on knowing. I had a very good reason.
She said they were paying her 3 dollars an hour. I was surprised. The Sanz was charging 6 dollars an hour and making 3 on her and giving us a lousy cold room to boot, so I promptly told them that I was no longer interested in taking lessons there. Then I convinced the IVS to pay her 4 dollars per hour, so everyone was happy except Sanz. But who cared about Sanz?
From then on, Nicole and I became best friends. We could now take lessons anywhere, so we went to the zoo to learn about animals or Georgetown market to learn the names of vegetables and fruits etc. or often we sat in the park near Dupont circle to take lessons there. I also made rapid progress to her delight, but I was not fluent yet.
One day my old Vietnam friends invited me to a get-together where a pleasant surprise was waiting for me. It was Suzanne. I could not believe this, and did not know that she was in town. Remember how I felt about her in Saigon? Here she was, the same and even more beautiful Suzanne.
When she came up to say goodbye, I blurted out that I had often thought what it would have been like had I known her more.I had kept it to myself because she was going with someone, but she was incredulous and kept on looking at me. Finally, she said that she had no idea that I would be interested in a plain girl like her. She was just being modest. She also said that she had broken up with her partner a long time ago and was working in D.C.
I did not know what to say or do because I never thought I would ever see her again, but here she was in Washington, D.C. in June 1971. I could call it fate or something. The days passed rather quickly. We had so much to talk about, and so much remained unsaid.
If Nicole noticed anything, she did not say, but one day she said that she would like to meet this girl who had cast such a spell on me. They got on splendidly as soon as they met, but Hubert was in the dark, and we kept him so. Suzanne was always late for appointments, or it seemed so because I was always waiting for her somewhere.
She brought me to a place called Monticello in Virginia, where a former president lived and kept slaves in his basement. The house was ordinary, but a stern old woman kept on yelling at kids who touched anything. She also brought me to the Shenandoah park and many other places. A concert near the Potomac River or a movie in the open air somewhere were many events I enjoyed. I remember the movie. It was the “The Man called horse” and the “Little big man”.
We even talked about our future together and wrote to Nirmal about her. He was very happy that at last I had met someone I could live with and welcomed her to the family. This was very gallant of him because I could sense the storm this news must have been causing back home. I came from a very traditional family where a marriage outside the caste or religion was unthinkable.
Our time passed quickly, but I also made steady progress in French. One day I went to a store where Nicole admired a necklace, so I secretly packed it for her and gave it as a surprise at my farewell party. My time in the United States had come to an end, and I was soon to leave for Paris. Hubert and many other friends came to the party, where I talked to Hubert for a long time that annoyed Suzanne, and she said so later.
Nicole was a wonderful girl. I will never forget her. She was also very French and crossed streets anywhere she pleased, at red lights or not. Once, I saw the red light and asked her to stop, but she went ahead anyway and found a policeman waiting on the other side. I had not seen him standing there, so he must have hid himself. Now he asked Nicole for an ID and fined her 5 dollars, which took her by surprise. I also got a ticket, so a lesson was learned. Nicole said that I should visit her parents in Compiegne.
But something had already gone wrong with Suzanne and I could feel it. She drove me to Dulles one day when I gave her a pair of earrings. We were saying goodbye again, but this time I could feel that it was more than that. I think she was more mature than I and knew at that time that nothing would come out of our new-found relationship. I was born to be a wanderer, and she was not. She had told me one day that she did not care to live anywhere except in the States, but for me, living in the States was out of the question. I did not belong there.
I was going where I wanted to go, out to Africa where I would work with farmers, like in Vietnam. Suzanne knew this and believed that I was a determined person, but so was she. We parted as friends, but I never saw her again and do not know to this day where she is and what she does.
In the air, I spent a lot of time thinking about it and felt sad. She had come into my life like a hurricane, but that is what she exactly was, a hurricane. As you know, hurricanes never last. They always move on, leaving behind devastation. I am not a weak person and do not feel downcast easily, but she had an effect that was hard to overcome. Perhaps time would cure it, as it usually does. I looked forward to landing in Paris once again.
In France, I was to visit the Gautier family in Compiegne as I had promised Nicole, so one day I took the train from the Gare du Nord. Nicole had drilled me well, so getting to Compiegne was not difficult. The Gautier family was delighted to receive me and went out of their way to make my short stay very enjoyable. They brought me to Pierrefond castle, Napoleon’s palace, the Foret de Compiegne where Marichal Foch had signed the armistice with Hitler and many other places of interest.
Mme Gautier brought me to Chantilly and the musee there had excellent paintings of Rembrandt and others, so the few days passed rapidly. I would have a chance to visit with this wonderful family again, but now I had to leave France because Algeria beckoned.
Leave a Reply