Athidi Devo Bhava

I noticed them on the bus. They were sitting on the seats across the aisle. They did not seem young enough to be called boys and girls and yet not old enough to be called a men and women. But from my vant(-)age point of view, I decided to call them boy and girl. The girl seemed to be guiding the boy about something. From the discussions I realized they were Americans. Also, their tone of discussion lacked the familiarity quotient and I decided they had only known each other for a few days or weeks. As the doors of the bus opened, the boy and I stood up. We looked at each other. I was in one of those rare benevolent mood and let him go ahead. He thanked me politely. The girl while picking up her large backpack dropped it and a number of hands helped her in picking it up. She thanked her helpers with a hint of embarrassment in her voice.

As I walked towards my seat, I saw them sitting in the seat ahead of mine. The girl was sitting by the window and the boy by the aisle. In the middle was an Indian. The girl had her head down as she busied herself with her mobile phone. The boy had a book in his hands. As he opened it, the Indian in the middle spoke. The conversation went as follows.

“Where are you from?”

“We are from the US”

“Why are going to Chennai?”

“We are going to Vellore from Chennai.”

“Why are you going to Vellore?”

“We are going to CMC, Vellore.”

“Any health problem?”

“No! We are studying to be Doctors.”

“Oh! MBBS?”

“No MD. In the US…”

“Oh! MD! You have already done your MBBS eh?”

“No, in the US…”

“You know we have MD in India too.”

“No. We are …”

“It’s very hard. This MBBS and MD and all.”

“But in this US MD is equivalent to MBBS in India. We are in the final year.”

“Oh is it! What are you doing in Jaipur?”

“Sightseeing. How about you? Are you from Chennai?”

“No I am not from Chennai. I have been working there for 3 years.”

“Oh! Are you from Jaipur?”

“No I came for a friend’s wedding. So are you in India for sightseeing?”

“No, we have come to study at CMC, Vellore. But in the weekends we travel to see places. We have been to Kerala and now Jaipur.”

“That’s fun! Have you seen the Golden Temple at Vellore?”

“No, we have heard about it though.”

“It is beautiful. You should go.”

“Sure! Will do.”

The two remained silent for some time. The boy opened his book and started reading. A few minutes later,…

“Have you gone to Pondicherry? You should. It’s beautiful.”

“Yeah! We have been to Pondicherry.”

“See this picture. How beautiful it is! You should see Pondicherry in the night. Its even more beautiful”

The guy in the middle shoves a phone on the boy’s face. He looks at the phone and mumbles something. The guys starts talking about other places in India that he thinks is beautiful. The boy looks at his book and tries his best to read. From time to time, he shakes his head and says “mmm hmmm”. The guy rambles on for many minutes and gets back to questioning about the boy’s background. In the ensuing minutes, the boy gives out the following details about his life in the US. 

• He is not from US but from Canada and so is a Canadian.
• He was born in Chicago but moved with his parents to New York.
• Someone he knows had come to India a few years back and had told him about the studying and staying in India. This inspired him to come to India.
• The north of US is cold. He was also forced to divulge that Canada is colder but the south of US tends to get hot like India.
• He was planning to be in CMC Vellore for 1 month after which he planned to spend 3 weeks going around India.
• He loved India and would definitely come back for a vacation later.
• He was staying at a hostel provided by CMC Vellore.
• When he had come to Jaipur he and the girl were sitting in entirely different rows but due to sheer coincidence they got seat in the same row.

Most of the conversation took place even before the flight had taken off. Once the flight took off, he placed his earphones inside his ears. The girl only looked in the direction of the other two once.