A long day was coming to an end. Shlok had survived two
massively demotivating and debilitating exams, that had somewhat dented his
sanity, and I had barely managed to walk out on my feet after what seemed like
the most mentally draining two hours in my examination career, when Siddharth
Prabhu – fondly christened ‘Sithappa’ - called up and commanded us to quickly
come home. Wishing not to incur Sithappa’s wrath, Shlok and I had urgently
walked back home, all the time discussing how badly our long term prospects
would be affected by those vile creatures called “Grades”.
As we stepped into our house, Sithappa told us in his deep,
slow and patient voice, “Get ready. We are going to Wheeling in West Virginia.
We leave at about 8, it’s a two hour drive. We can drive down there, and go
around a little bit. Then start again at around 12. We can return by 2.” That
was how Sithappa had always been. He first attacked you with a seemingly odd
idea, and then before your mind could reason out why it was an odd idea, he hit
you with a ‘plan’ that sounded so good, it couldn’t be wrong. So while I was
still processing the 5 sentences he had just said, I could already hear myself
saying “Yes, sure!”
Friday nights are probably the most exciting evenings of the
entire week. There is so much euphoria in the air, in anticipation of the
weekend that is coming (though all you do is just sleep through it), and the
whole city is out on the streets partying, that you don’t want to miss out on
the fun, that you start finding everything around you entertaining and oozing
with elation, and that even Rebecca Black finally makes sense. So even though
Sithappa’s idea to drive down a 140 miles to the middle of the Appalachian
nowhereness, sounded pathetic, at that moment, it was THE thing to do.
“But what are we planning to do after going there?” remarked
Shlok with his characteristic sense of barely hidden incredulity and derision,
bringing my wandering mind back to reality.
“Well there is a
really old Suspension Bridge there, a national landmark. I really think it’s a
place we must go to see”, Sithappa replied. That sounded good enough to me.
Suspension bridges were always cool !
Shlok was not giving up easily, “But we are driving down
across the state in the middle of the night to see a bridge? Is it worth it?”
“I definitely think so, there’ll be lights and all, and a
bridge across a river, and we are doing nothing on a Friday evening anyway, so
why not go there and return”
“We could go to Hollywood Casino, spend some bucks and have
fun for the night. Why waste our time going somewhere we don’t know is half as
much fun?”
“There is a really big casino in Wheeling too! We could go
there if you want. It’ll be great fun there”. Shlok was visibly not convinced,
but the promise of a casino in a different city made him less hostile to the
idea, and eventually he agreed. His only condition – We have food before we
leave. Sithappa said yes, the deal was signed!
We were off! We were joined by Siddharth Baskar (Bosskhar).
The plan was to go have food at some restaurant in about an hour, and leave by
9.15-9.30, reach wheeling before 11.30, have fun, and return home by about 3.
By the time the waiters in the underpowered and remarkably
slow serving Udipi Café in Columbus brought us our numerous variants of Masala
Dosa, considerable time had already passed. It was already beyond 10 PM. Our
plan, which had sounded remarkable simple and obvious, was not going very well.
Sensing the opportunity, Shlok quipped, “Are we surely going
to Wheeling? I mean I really want to go, but don’t you think it is kind of
late? Won’t it take too long to return?”
Sithappa thought for a minute, and chose to ignore Shlok’s ‘well-meaning
and anxious concerns’, and soon we were on our way again.
Twenty Miles into Interstate 70, things were looking good.
We were making good progress. The road was curving around in intriguing turns,
and the full moon was shining down upon us, rendering a tranquil light on
surroundings, just enough to look around and appreciate the beauty of the Ohio landscape
dotted with fields, forests and small towns alternatively. But watching
cornfields is no IPL game, and we soon realized that we needed a better form of
entertainment. How could there ever be an awesome trip without awesome music?
We
started exploring FM options, but then again, there is no Radio Mirchi or Big
FM in the USA and one might agree that it is better to suffer in silence than
listen to people you don’t know, advertising things you haven’t heard of, in
between songs you have never listened to. So we decided that we might as well
switch off the radio, and turn on some good old Indian music, but the car
played only audio CD’s and we did not have any. But we could always buy some CD’s
and write songs couldn’t we ?
The GPS found us a Walmart store 6 miles off I70, and we
decided that 10 minutes off track could not have a big impact on our plan. We
were wrong. Because 10 miles of alleys, 50 mph-limit single lane roads, and
creepy haunted forests later, we were in the middle of the Ohio countryside, certainly not
close to a Walmart, which according to the map was another 12 miles away. Shlok
was groaning, Sithappa was getting flustered, and Bosskhar and I were just
looking out of the window on the vast expanses of potential spooky villages
where werewolves could be active on Full moon nights.
When we finally did land at Walmart, half hour later, and
found the CD’s we were looking for, and got back into the car, it was already
12.30 and we realized we were only 30 miles from home. The quest
for the Walmart had almost brought us back to Columbus.
To top it, Shlok had checked the timings of the Casino in
Wheeling and it was closed already. Shlok took the opportunity to point out, “Are
we surely going to Wheeling? I mean I really want to go, but don’t you think it
is kind of late? Won’t it take too long to return? We could go to Hollywood
Casino, spend some bucks and have fun for the night. Why waste our time going
somewhere we don’t know is half as much fun?”
For the third time in the evening, the question had come up
again if we did want to go on the trip. This time, Shlok had struck the right
note, because Sithappa turned the car and we decided that Hollywood Casino was
the more practical destination for the evening. Bosskhar and I were still
looking out of the window, like innocent kids going out with their parents.
But this did not feel right. I mean we were having fun just
sitting in the car and seeing the roads, and the moon and the spooky trees. Why
go back home just as yet? Or the casino, where there was nothing to do anyway
apart from the free Coke. We could keep going for another couple of hours. For
the first time in the evening, me and Bosskhar spoke and convinced Sithappa
that we had to go to Wheeling, if not for anything else, at least for having
gone through the pain to get the CD’s from Walmart.
Shlok said,"But why would you want to go all the way there just to see a bridge ??"
It was then that Sithappa, in a moment of George Mallory-ish inspiration quipped,
"Because it is there!"
We pulled
over to the right, took the next exit, and before there were any other protests from Shlok, we were back on our way and on track!
Two hours later, we were in Wheeling. And on one of the
World’s oldest Suspension bridges, on Ohio river. It did look a little weird and
reckless to a greater extent, walking on a suspension bridge, in the middle of
the night in a city that did not seem to have any people, but me and Bosskhar
did it anyway, and it was among the coolest experiences in the USA, not least
because a cold breeze was blowing on the open river. The bridge was made up
only of steel gratings, and looking down, we could see the river flowing. It
was like walking on footpaths over drainage systems. What if one of those
gratings was loose and it actually caved in when we stepped on it? That’s when
I put my phone back in pocket and held on firmly to the railings and slowly
walked, careful to feel each and every grating’s structural integrity before
completely stepping onto it. I survived the short walk, and reached the car!
The casino in Wheeling was long closed, and Shlok was
sitting depressed in the car. We decided to go have some coffee, and chanced
upon Perkin’s, the only café/restaurant that seemed to be open. We went there
just to get some coffee or hot chocolate, but the Menu card looked so good, we
decided to expand our plans and ended up having a full course meal instead. Yup,
at 4 in the morning, we were having either an extremely late dinner or a
delightfully early breakfast. Whatever it was, it was among the best American
meals I have ever had.
* * *
Once our appetites were satisfied, and once all plans to spend
the night and leave the next morning, proceed to Pittsburgh to have a go at the
Casino there, and return later were promptly rejected by Sithappa, at about
4.30, we started on our journey back, discussing how great our night had been.
The plan had been constantly under question, and we had decided more than once,
to drop the plan and head back home, and yet, there we were, on I70, returning
from one of our most memorable Friday evenings.
* * *
Shlok was sadly sleeping in the car, heartbroken that we
never quite made it to a casino. Bosskhar and Siddharth were on about electronics,
banks and filters, reminding me of those sad days when I had to deal with solid
state devices and semiconductors.
At a distance we could see the Columbus skyline, against the
backdrop of the golden orange sky at the crack of dawn. It was among the more
beautiful sights I have seen that my Lumia 920 camera is not capable of
capturing. The best images around us are for our eyes only. Cameras have no
work capturing the beauty of a moment - they capture only an image. Beauty, as
we know, is in the eyes of the beholder.
Good food, good places, good long drives, good memories.
Life’s Good!
