After living abroad for a decade, city hopping from Los Angeles to New York City, I am finally back home. I have loved every minute of living in the USA. Los Angeles is set in beautiful surroundings of the Pacific Ocean on one side and the Santa Monica mountain ranges on the other.
The best thing is the Southern California weather that is pleasant the entire year. The city is ideal for outdoor activities, hiking, cycling and even just strolling past the Westwood area of family owned shops and restaurants.
It is also good for college going students who do not have to spend much on winter wear like those in New York City have to. Although one must have a car since the weather makes it convenient to go out into the mountains or the spectacular deserts during the weekends.
Also for an UCLA student, finding an affordable housing means either to share apartments with other students in the expensive university area or finding budget apartments away from the university in Venice or West Los Angeles area.
Since public transportation is not at par with that of the East coast, due to being an earthquake susceptible region and so no underground subways, cars are the most valuable possession of an individual in Los Angeles.
Be it the dreaded 405 or the monotonous 5 or the scenic route 66, a drive through each of them is a memorable experience.
Especially the pacific coast highway that takes you from Los Angeles to San Francisco to the north and the San Diego area to the south, the sun rippling through the waves on one side and the mountains nodding at the pristine blue sky on the other makes one happy in a very serene way.
New York City was another wonderful experience especially memories of living on Roosevelt Island makes me feel at once nostalgic. The island is in the midst of East river with mid East side Manhattan on one bank and Queens on the other.
There is a cute tram that runs on cables and connects the Island to Manhattan… waltzing above the East river. There is also a bus service to Queens and a subway F line stopping on the Island.
The Island is peaceful and ideal for raising young children and for living after retirement. It has a public library and two children parks. There are also areas for family picnic and barbecue grills. The best part is to be able to see the lights of Manhattan through you window in the night and its reflection on the quietly flowing East river.
I enjoyed living on the island and working in Manhattan. Manhattan is always awake. The sidewalks are filled with people running to work, occasionally studded with aroma emanating Algerian and Bangladeshi gyro carts; the roads are spilling with overflowing traffic.
The shops lining the side walks are mostly family owned. There are shops serving toasted bagels with cream cheese and a cup of coffee to the breakfast crowd. Lunch is usually quick and the carts serve to their patrons either chicken over yellow rice or lamb gyro on rice or pita bread.
For dinner, there are fancy restaurants where one can sit outside and enjoy a glass of wine and a dinner plate while commuters walk by. There are also affordable take outs of spicy Chinese or Mexican food or mildly aromatic Middle Eastern and Thai food.
New York City is truly international in its flavor, be it in its ethnicity, culture or palate.
I was a die hard Jackson heights visitor. Where else would you get tasty Indian and Bangladeshi food? The area encompasses two lanes adjacent to Broadway. The nearest subway stop is Roosevelt Avenue. The two lanes are filled with South Asian shops.
There are groceries where one gets to buy everything from Maggi to dosa idli batter. There are jewelry shops selling metal bal Gopal or bal Ganesh statues. There are clothing shops selling Bollywood inspired Ghagras and of course there are shops selling audio and videos of latest Bombay flicks.
The best part is to see shops with hoardings in Bangla, selling mouth watering rossogollas and moglai parotas. There are fish and meat shops selling ilish and tangra and also tender goat meat.
So when we found out that the husband had got a very satisfying offer from back home (New Delhi) to be exact, we were at once elated and sad. Elated because we always wanted to come back home and sad because we had really enjoyed living in USA.
Together with the fact that we had gotten used to life in USA and a nagging anxiety of getting culture shocked again and adjusting all over to India.
We were a little worried about settling down in Delhi since it was a new city for both of us and since we did not have any friends or family here, we were to say the least, nervous!
But we did take the plunge and so began the rest of our lives……
