A little over one new airline every year since I started flying…

It is not like I am the only one wearing shorts in Delhi airport at 6 in the morning.

It is just that I am the oldest one.

By a jaw-dropping margin!!

Strolling around Delhi airport, walked into “Dilli Streats”. Loved the pun! Was immediately hit by the rich aroma of some of the most flavorful food from India!
From punjabi tikka chicken to delhi paranthas to South Indian masala dosas to what have you. I was salivating at all those delectable plates and started listing what all I wanted to order. Also started counting how many miles I have to run to get rid of those calories.

I came up to 125 miles in the first week after I return.

A small cup of Starbucks cappuccino, it is then!!

We are over Turkmenistan right now and approaching the “Golden Age Lake”. One of the more ambitious efforts in Central Asia, this was to create a very long lake. If you can see the vertical walls on the picture below – that is the Karashor depression. It is a very long (100 miles?) depression with a height of nearly 80 feet below sea level!!

It was a very controversial project and considered mostly to have failed in reaching its objectives.

I am back at an airport to go to India with my suitcase, backpack and a picture being taken on a timer with the phone propped up against whatever it is that airports have to prop up a phone with. This is when I usually tell you how this is a secret from my parents or that I have a few goals to keep.

This one is different though. There is nobody to keep my secrets from. I do not even know how to set goals for myself this time. For all the best laid plans I had, life upstaged the cards such that I could not even accompany them on their individual last journey. If not thru the eyes of my brother and sister who lived close to them, I would have always wondered what that journey looked like for my parents…

I have always believed that my parents had lives that we should celebrate. Coming from a level of financial situation I cannot possibly fathom, they pulled themselves to a successful life and in that pulling, gave me and my two siblings enough momentum that we hurled ourselves to what my parents would undoubtedly judge “greater success”. That is what they lived for. That is what they died for.

I can quibble over the details of their choices, but I cannot begrudge even a bit what they have achieved thru their three children.

So, again, let us raise a toast to them.

And then, as I put my glass of wine down at thirty thousand feet above the Atlantic, I am confronted with the inevitable “Now what?” question. How am I going to escape the fact that I am going to walk into the same house and find nobody there? For all the irritation that I used to have the moment I entered the house every time – for what I thought at that time as excessive fawning from them, there is going to be none this time to worry about.

How am I going to face my own siblings who gave – thru their sweat and tears – accompaniment thru the intense suffering that my parents went thru when all I could do was see them on a WhatsApp video call? For all those intense internal burning downstairs in the basement by myself after seeing my parents on video, what must have it really felt like to see in real life with your own eyes?

But any emotion expressed has to only flow towards the celebration of their lives. The pangs of something being taken away ought to be outweighed by the realization of the gift that was presented to begin with.

So, I am going to put only 3 simple goals this time..

“Train engine”
You may remember how my parents often told me that as the eldest sibling, I was like the engine of a train. Wherever I went, my siblings would follow. In accordance, in this trip, my goal is to stay strong and in every step and word, exude the marvel at what our parents achieved thru us. The countenance of mine has to be of celebratory in nature. The mood has to be that of counting the blessings of what we had and not what we lost. From the moment I walk into the empty house with my siblings in tow to the time when I wave them goodbye to come back to America … I have to be the reason why they see hope and the positive in everything the three of us have had.

The crying can wait. (I am still human; I just need to control it)

“Thank you”
I am not sure what is the right way to say Thank You to my siblings for all the hard work they did in the last few years of my parents. And none of this was easy. I have to believe this has created a lot of tensions in their own families and frankly a level of frustration that life dealt them a tough set of cards. For me – I was pushed by my family to go abroad and secure the financial stability of the whole family – but that also meant, I did not have to deal with the day to day grind. Now that it is all over, how do I express my gratitude? I am not sure how, but my goal number 2 is to put in the first installment by creating a couple of memorable days for my siblings – whichever way they want.

“And then… there was one…”
Right now, between Sharmila and I, we have only one parent left (her mom). While my mother in law and I cannot possibly think of anything any more different, I do realize that that is the thinnest of strings that we are hanging on in terms of the “previous generation”. She has had one vaccination already and I have had two. My goal is to see if I can sit down with her and have some quality time. If I can only pull her out of the kitchen trying to make more food for me, I might just be able to…

Normally, I love seeing my old friends, teachers, parents of my friends and so on … anytime I go to India. They have all influenced me in ways small and large to be who I am today. I owe that – if not for anything else – just to say Thank you. This time, though, I will have to constrain myself to spending all my time with my siblings and mother in law (and a couple of relatives that were close to my mom and dad). I do promise to make up in the next trip though…

A final thought… I am struggling with “What does India mean after this trip?” question. Sure, I have my siblings – but they have their own lives. Parents were why I fox trotted to India every quarter. They had all the time for me. Now, why do I have to come to India to visit my siblings? There are so many other places we could meet. Will trips to India eventually lose all the significance to me? Will a big part of my own identity be lost for ever?

I wonder if I could switch places with my parents. Sort of. Could I possibly become to my two nephews and one niece what my parents were for me? And by that I mean, can I create a relationship with the three of them that would be so strong that I will still get on to flights to India with the suitcase, backpack, selfie and all that? Maybe, instead of a train engine to my siblings, I can be the same for my nephews and niece?

Fourth goal this trip, you think?

A seat belt !! For take off, we had to put on a shoulder harness in addition to the standard airplane seat belt. Never seen this before. This is on United flight from Newark to New Delhi.

Simple geometry would suggest that the middle position should not be there. In fact, the more mathematically oriented will point out that the middle point of a square with six feet sides is only 1/sqrt(2) of six feet or about 70% of the required distance…

I am not sure why they put this there. This is in the elevator to the United Club in Newark airport. I was going to ask the lady at the counter but between my mask, her mask, two layers of plexiglass and six feet of separation, I thought the better of it!!

The math nerd in me still protests!

For somebody obsessed with creating intersection points, the city of New York could not have been a more appropriate point to create a generational intersection. I landed today in the city of more street intersections than I can think of drawn by two forces…

Here to settle out on the property in the city where the next generation (Natasha) is going to settle down for the foreseeable future…

Also here to catch a flight to India to confront a new reality there … that the prior generation (dad and mom) has been unsettled for ever…

In the hustle and bustle of this city, standing at a street intersection anywhere… that is the lesson of life you as thee middle generation learn…

People come… and people go…

The old order changeth yielding place to new…