B"aa"sten Travelogue

B"aa"sten Travelogue

Sorry to be hogging too much space..if there is a plethora of blogs the coming week, I 'll move this blog to a text file and create a link.

Before you jump on me asking why I spelt Boston as Baasten, let me tell you that the city smells funky. A beautiful historic city split by the River Charles, which runs through the heart of its downtown. You walk across the trail touching all the historic sites and as you feel this whiff of fresh air.. well 80% of the time, the other 20% you are greeted with this funky smell every avenue you cross, every block you walk.So much so that we rechristened the city Baasten. Rechristening and inventing new cult dialogues was the essence of this trip. A day-2-day event log (Enough footage to each event -- Hail Dr Saab !)

Fri Sep 2: Bala and Kausum headed to Boston from Baltimore by their 7.40 flight which reached Manchester, NH at 9.00. Savitha( a.k.a Savithamma was supposed to pick us up from the Manchester airport). So till 10pm, the time my United Airways flight reached Manchester, I guess Savitha and Kausum had to endure Bala's trademark leg-pulling for which there is never really a good retort except SILENCE sometimes.Headed home and reached by 11. Savitha's house is a three bedroom- 2 1/2 bath beautiful but stereotypical American townhome. Huge living room,three bedrooms and a kitchen,spotlessly clean and let me just say 'Looks like a home'. Some exquisite tomato rice and egg-mushroom rice with Raita was the menu as decided (Apna to baat ho gaya tha naa).Had our customary chat and leg-pulling session and went to bed a bit early after reading the hillarious shaadi.com success stories (a new name for absolute disaster)

Sat Sep 3: POA was to get up early, but the peace you feel sleeping late on weekends and the thought that there were three more days of vacation left, ensured that we got our lazy asses out of bed around 11.30.Took the 'T'(the metro) to Boston downtown.Had Khaana Waana at the Sultan's Middle Eastern Cuisine and then trudged along to Quincy Market.Its a nice happening place with some street performance or the other going on.We saw an Aussie juggler, who had us in splits and then some elastic bodies who did all the acrobatics which would make Nadia Comaneci et al proud. Visited one of the oldest post offices and took a lot of pictures.Just across the street is a wharf and we can see the beautiful Logan airport landing strip.We started to walk along the 'Red Line'( read Reah lie) , the historic Boston downtown trail. The trail touches all the historic sites in Boston downtown right from the old post offices, courthouses , the innumerable buildings built by Goli's early progenies and finally leads us into the NY Central Park style Boston Commons.There is a duck pond in the center of the park where I made a few swans with low intellectual ability earn their food. We then walked along the Boylston street and saw this church where supposedly the first gay marriage ("I hereby pronounce you husband and husband" sort) was held. Our trail ended with a nice stroll along the banks of the river Charles with the magnificient Boston skyline in the backdrop.Savitha then beefed up our expectations about a Chaat place called "Punjab" which is supposedly famous for Bombay style pani-puri, bhel-puri and other chaat.( Balls pls comment on this). A brilliant evening was ended by a fun
filled hour at the bowling alley where we also played frictionless table 1-on-1 hockey.

Sun Sep 4:Last year labor day weekend I was in Boston and I had gone on a picture clicking spree .A usual messup not surprisingly.. and I lost all of them. The day I had awaited had arrived .I was ready to go back to get what I had lost (Been there done that pictures).After a nice lunch at a Thai/Korean/Chinese place we were on our way to the hallowed grounds of MIT. Walking through the long corridoors, we were like the whingeing Poms with comments like "This is where I belong".It is a pretty humbling experience to be in a place which is the abode of beings
who are several intellectual stratas above us. The main dome is simply spectacular and each and every structure exhibits top notch architecture. Every brick in the walls of MIT emanates class . The exquisite old buildings of the Gugenheim Aeronautical Labs and the main dome have a perfect foil in the Stata Center whose structure I failed to comprehend. A bizarre (of snow bizarre) structure with aluminium foils protruding out, it encompasses a multitude of geometric shapes.But still has a peculiar brilliance confirming the rebellious genius of these MITians.An hour and twenty "been there done that " photographs later we were on our way to the Harward
campus.Our stay at Harvard was pretty short and most of the time was spent near the statue of John Harvard, polishing his shoes to gain the much required intelligence we were deprived of since birth.Dinner was at the Indian restaurant Bombay, where I once again helped these guys finish off everything in great style cleaning my plate to the extent of seeing my face in it (hyperboles galore).The dumb charades we played at night was a fitting end to a fun filled day.

Mon Sep 5:Theme of the day..RELAX karte hai. Did nothing..sat on our asses..ate nice upma made by Sav and in the evening we were back to where it all began..back to our world where we would be doing the same old breathe,eat,drink,spawn and die.

Top three incidents:
3.The absolutely whacky game of frictionless table hockey in the games arcade of "Games and Lanes" after an hour of bowling.The number of own goals we scored while playing each other just putting pace before guile was absolutely hillarious.Absolutely all aspects of our personality came out within half an hour of play.Bala crumbled under pressure created by the opponent and I under the pressure created by myself.
2.The rechristening of Savitha as Savithamma and her absolute cult dialogue "I am such an angel as compared to you guys" during the necessary talks of death and destruction.
1.Bala's new Freaks top 20, "Issi ke saath.." which was the standard after every short conversation ended and a cigarette was lit.

Conclusion : Bala and I were discussing that we usually go on a trip with the Freaks gang and even if the place leaves a lot to be desired, its the companionship which makes the trip a huge hit. The Boston trip was a deviation to the norm(not the normal Freaks gang) , but excellent planning( due credits Savitha), less driving and the numerous funny incidents makes it a trip, which will give me fond memories when I am as old as Goli ( in my zillionth life).