Life was getting busier and more eventful day by day. I realized that the pretense of my friends in the US of being busy all the time was actually false and I could understand them in a much better way since I was myself going through all this.

One thing I always wanted to incorporate during my stay in US was the American Accent. It sure is a big challenge to break the mould of the british accent, which we have deeply ingrained and put up the American accent. I was continuously observing the peculiarities of the accent and making sure that I converse with at least one foreigner a day for this purpose. "I guess its coming to me" and it sure feels good because you feel more at home. There is a general practice amongst International students to stick to their cultures and converse in their traditional languages in the company of Americans too; this habit is loathed by the community and is not the right thing to do.

My experiences in the US were getting richer day by day. Since the burden of studies was growing day by day we guys were finding difficulty in pursuing cooking -- and then came the spree of American Pizzas (something that I guess every American Loves and you'll find in almost every young party and get-together). They are the best and the most approproiate diet when a homework is due the next day or there is an exam coming up.

Very particularly the telephone numbers in US are more commonly denoted by the alphabet(for example 37-GATOR for 374-2867) and they sure make weird names. My first order of a pizza was very much motivated by the mention of free-beer along with the pizza for which I settled with Domino's because they had this special offer and I just couldn't resist it. I ordered the pizza and a moment of embarassment was due when I asked for free beer and the guy said, "Dude, FRE-BEER is the telephone number for Domino's!"

During the initial settling stages I realized that there are many things that are required to be procured for example books, supplies, and especially Indian groceries (because they were getting depleted day by day and I had a limited supply of these available with me). There was only one answer to all these questions - Shopping on the Internet and the Credit Card. The credit card is a very important tool for buying almost anything in the US. It provides the flexibility of having plastic money and also building a good credit history (something I have mentioned earlier). Finally,after a wait of 3 weeks I received one of the best credit cards around from Citibank (there are so many of them here that people actually carry 12-13 cards in their pocket at one point of time). It was worthwhile because I had already fixed a long list of purchases to be made from the Internet which necessitate the use of a credit card which included my textbooks (I had landed up with a lot of websurfing on textbooks because I noticed large variations in their prices between different websites and of course a phenomenal difference in these prices and the prices at the University Bookstore), Indian groceries (namaste.com was on everyone's lips and I was longing to put a tadka of desi ghee in my dinner), and a couple of gifts for all my family at home now that I had started earning and owed them a lot. It was a great feeling doing shopping on the Internet and sending mementos to my people back home (something I had never done before in India).

Among the hustle and bustle I was realizing that presence of a big indian community on campus (which I guess is a common factor in US educational institutions) was a big consolation. We have frequent cultural shows and get togethers with Indian themes and the luscious Indian dinners which are a part of community cooking where people get together to cook. Besides, picnicking and parties are a common occurence. It gives a good reprieve from the burdensome work and is sure something great to do in the weekend.

Very soon a big buzz started arising for the plans for December since that is the festival time and people dont prefer to stay at the University making it a point to travel to different places in the US. I was planning to visit a close friend in New York and making a budget for it, the biggest contribution of which was the air ticket. There is a big and very popular system of ticketing online in the US and most tickets are available through auctions at heavily discounted prices and as the departure time approached the prices of tickets start to rise. There are many travel agencies which offer such discounts to students including the ones located on campus. I am still looking for a ticket and am not ready to pay a dime more than 200 dollars and I'm sure I'll get one soon.

Letter 5

Nitin Ahuja

Letter 7