(An Overtly Excited Justice of India in Niagara) disclaimer: prem says he does not smoke anymore and that he is an expert driver now
Pre-trip
Prem Kumar had been in the US for quite a while. He had wasted away his time in Edison, NJ with nothing to do; no girls around so that he could get on with his usual Krishna avatar of going after all of them. Bored and frustrated, he called me up and Mahendra about going on a trip. He was persistent and insistent and lo we had agreed on driving to Niagara and back.
2006 Jul 1 Saturday
I flew in from LA overnight thru Denver and hit the sack as soon as I stepped in at home; Ms Madhu tried to keep me awake to no avail. Prem and Mahendra called up many a times to find me sleeping every time. Finally told them to come over in by 4 pm. Prem with his uncanny Indian driving skills got lost in the Streets of Philadelphia and reached Ben Franklin Pky and our home. Tea from madhu which neither prem nor mahendra could finish – wanky guys who could not finish even a simple cup of tea. Prem had rented the car from National in NJ and we wanted to add my name to the rental contract and drove to philly airport – btw, a Saturn SUV. I had asked him to get insurance and he had made sure that he had added every damn kind of insurance on the rental car - no matter even if u spat on the car it was covered.
As usual, and as we have seen all along, the person at the national desk was clueless of what was to be done; he just knew about creating new contracts but not modifying an existing one to add another driver. Got it done after a long explanation; later found that he had added my name to some other contract – so much for specialization skills in the US of A. We got out at 7 pm and I took on the wheels to hit I 476 all the way up to Scranton. Break for food with prem lighting his batti. He was a ditto clone of Dany – smoking and punging about speeding – of course dany boy is more careful about driving now.
We played the audio track of kannada jokes with mimicry dayanand imitating Dinesh, Mukhya mantra chandru and the muslim drivers of auto and bus. These imitations impressed mahendra with him picking up the deep voice of Dinesh.
2006 Jul 2 Sunday
I handed over the wheels to prem near Scranton and he drove all the way up to Syracuse to reach I-90. We folded the back seats over and the SUV turned into a neat little mobile sleeping home for us. We put all our luggage in the back and then I slept sound, with Rahman’s tamil music in the background and madhu beside me. The drive on I-90 was my turn and not wanting to delay I drove in earnest and speed to reach Buffalo. Nagi had advised us to go by 290 and see the HSBC tower, but we took a pass and went on straight to the Niagara parking lot. The parking lot was not open, we managed to find another one and parked on the first floor.
Not wanting to miss the sunrise we headed towards the river at 430 am. Bad luck, the sun was up, but was hidden behind the clouds, so no view for us. However the river was breath-taking, it moves with such force here. Like Vishweswarrayya canal in KRS but a lot more wider. Walking along the river we reached American falls on the American side. Amazing. I had seen photos of the falls and had never been awed at it. Somehow like Grand Canyon no photos can capture the beauty of the falls, standing close by you could look on in wonder. We walked across the US side of the river to reach the Goat island. Long back during a famine 
everything except a goat had died here and hence the name. Some years back there was a paper mill on the island, but prudence had made the Americans destroy it. We walked along to the bridal veil falls and then onto the main attraction the horseshoe falls. Imagine a wide concave wall rising almost 10-15 stories high and almost .5-1 km across. It is a wide expanse, almost as wide as the boating lake pool in KRS. It is around 3/4th the height of the KRS dam. It curves much more than the KRS walls. Now imagine the whole of KRS water flowing over this curved wall, in one smooth motion with no gaps in between. At the top it is just 2-3 feet of falls cascading over the wall, but below you find it roaring in a misty falls. Such a beautiful sight. We had come here at 5-6 am in the morning, so there was no one around. We took a lot of photos realizing that such an opportunity of being able to take photos with no one around was a rare occurrence. We walked up to the bridal veil falls where you get very close to the water. There are steps at the bottom where you have a mist trail, close to the falls, and drenching you in the mist.
We went back to the parking lot. Our next stop was the visiting center so that we could dump our shit. It was empty, prem & mahendra could not find the restroom easily even though it was in plain sight, maybe the anxiety to pot. The loo was a dump – with one of them clogged. It looked like one of many in an Indian railways general compartment toilet – although Lallu has miraculously turned the railways around. We managed to bear the stench and take turns. I had my usual browsing session on the blackberry 
finding that the whirlpool ride on the niagara river was costly and ditched the idea of going there.
There was Punjabi dhaba on the way, in fact a lot of advertisement for Indian food – surprising indeed and an annoyance as we were to find later. An Indian accosted us advertising fresh food. We ordered paratha here. Crap food, the advertised fresh food was nowhere to be found. Madhu analyzed the batani, as she usually does, and declared that they were sticky and stale. We cursed the hotel and the Indian. He came over and said that it was very fresh. Another favourite sentence of his was to declare himself to be the “Justice of India” – he was a lawyer or a professor in puna university; so he claimed!! He had left that job to come over to the US and now he was a waiter here. Right he was “Justice of India”. Mahendra quipped whether he was not the “President of India”. This justice also claimed that there were bevy of beautiful girls who liked him in India, because he had such a sweet voice and sung to everyone’s appreciation; but he had left them too to be a “Waiter of US”. It was amusing and we cursed him for spoiling the experience with the food. We went back to the parking lot, with madhu insisting that we sleep. We slept till very late in the car. More surprises awaited us.
We woke up and went down to find ourselves in a sea of indian’s more expansive than even the water of Niagara. Niagara is one of the very few places that everyone in India knows about along with puttali-bhai i.e. statue of liberty. Every mother at home asks if her son/daughter has been to the Niagara and wants a photo of her son/daughter in front of the falls – including my mother. Being a weekend, a long weekend around the july 4 independence day, it felt like the whole Indian diaspora in north-eastern US was there. The only other people were some Europeans and a lot of Chinese. If you count around 100 visitors to Niagara then about 90 of them will be us, the rest 5-6 being Chinese and then some Europeans. On the Canada side it is the same story, with 70 of the 90 indians being from Punjab as nagi told us later. Mahendra and prem were wondering about why the US had given over the more beautiful side of horseshoe falls to Canada, as they usually muscle up all the good things for themselves – maybe now the question to ask is why Niagara is not a national park? Why it is a picnic garden for Indians. Another irritation was the behavior. When we are by ourselves US we behave like the Americans, but with so many of us it was chaos – like visiting KRS, everyone everywhere helter-skelter; traffic being stopped where you wanted it to be stopped, people breaking the line with an andhrite dad beside me saying “let us move ahead, let these people stand here while we rush in”. We also got to see our favourite hawai chappali, the ones nagi prefers, the multi-colored ones from the carts around KR circle. Note also the fact that 50 of the 90 indians we talked about earlier are from maa telugu naadu – Andhra.
I had a huge glob of ice cream and we proceeded towards the maid of the mist boat rides. Another sea of Indians there, with a long queue to get onto to the boat. You are given plastic parkas to protect yourself from being drenched and packed like cows in a stable onto the boat. The boat goes all the way near the falls, in the curve of the concave. All around water whirls in anger, the boat’s engine in full blast, you look down and you feel that you are racing ahead and you look up to find yourself stationary. What do you see there? The whole wall of water roaring down, mist rising up high into the air, you can’t see the center of the concave, seeing only the edges. Mahendra suddenly got a doubt that there was a gap at the center of the falls – cos he could not see it thru the mist, which we did not attempt to find – no amount of convincing from prem made him convinced. Beside the falls is an old and abandoned power house, wonder how it was built as it would always be drenched in water – we also talked about how no curing of cement being necessary here.
Daredevils and madmen abound everywhere in the world – no exception in Niagara. Of course daredevilry is banned in these times of so called progress!! However earlier, people used to cross the horseshoe falls on oak barrels. A widow had made a daring attempt and succeeded, trying to raise money for herself. A boat had fallen over the falls, with only a small boy surviving miraculously. Niagara is no river. It is just a canal connecting the great lakes together. Surprising that two lakes so near had a height difference causing this falls. Looking behind the horseshoe falls over the water you find the wrath of humans – ugly sky scrapers, all of them casinos. Except one which is like the seattle space needle the rest are all just block buildings marring the horizon. Further down the river is a rainbow bridge which spans across the river, it connects the US and Canada.
We alighted the boat and came to the view-point. The view-point is a half bridge, spanning half way across the river to form a semi arch. This gives the best view of the river from the US side without needing you to go to Canada. A lot of photos, some shopping for stuff to send back home and we were ready for lunch. We had some cold beer and sports bar food and decided to leave. The night view based on the photos was enticing but we did not want to stay longer and decided to drive towards the Adirondacks; got lost in the traffic but finally reached I-90.
Me and madhu slept on the way to Adirondacks with a short break for some snacks. Took over from prem, but it was already late. Prem always claimed that he drove at 100 miles on the highway, but everytime he drove we reached our destination late. It was already 5 and the moutains were nowhere in sight with a good 50 miles more to to. I took over and tried to catch up on time; we reached the mountains thru highway 8 towards Higgins bay at around 6. Prem wanted to pick up some beer and we went into a grocery store. Madhu finding so many discount sales picked up detergent, juice, etc. After paying for them she found that there was no discount applied; I taunted her and then it led off to a fight between us to the others amusement.
In silence I drove, with an angry madhu, but a breath-taking sight broke the ice. It was a state highway with me driving slow, suddenly on the road I saw a huge animal on four legs – hairy and giant – wobbling along. A bear, what a sight it was. Madhu was shell shocked and could not find her camera, and the bear crossed the road and went into the denseness beyond. We stopped by the side. A woman stopped drove up beside our car and told us that there were bear cubs around and she had seen them. This was probably the mother which she had not seen. Madhu was perked for the rest of the drive awaiting another sight, which never turned up.
Our initial idea had been to camp in the Adirondacks for the night, not wanting to rent a room. However with the sight of the bear and it being so late and sort of rainy we did not want to take a chance – moreover our bones ached. We decided to turn back to philly. Trying to take a u-turn I (madhu claims it was her ;-) found the side road leading in, like in a scary movie, and madhu wanted to go further to explore. I drove along to find it not being a wild path, but houses on either side with lights twinkling and then finally a lake glistening in the moonlight. Serendipity which madhu claims as her find!!!
We stopped by the lake, probably some lake in the Higgins bay area. We had bought roasted
chicken and wanted to eat here. We found a lot of cars parked on the road side and on asking were told that there would be fire works on the other side of the lake. Excited we walked to the waters edge with our food. Soon the fireworks started. The July 4 fireworks with mountains as the backdrop, the lake in the front reflecting the moon light and the fireworks, and we on the edge of the lake sitting on a old wooden park bench with the water kissing softly near our feet. Turkey and chicken in our stomach we were all set. The fireworks were beautiful, some of them even exploding to form the shape of a star, all the riotous color in the sky with the sound reaching us delayed by a few seconds. Madhu called up home to describe the unfolding scene. Prem and mahendra with beer in their belly and smoke in their lungs were in bliss. Mahendra had a little pony tail.
I drove back to reach I-90 with silence between me and madhu with the fight between us. It was dark all around, dense forests, the drive passing thru quaint little towns with their lights twinkling and reflecting in the abundant lakes in the thick darkness. Changed driver roles with prem who drove into Pennysylvani half asleep and his famed speed. By the time I took over again, he was driving half in sleep. He had to sleep, but somehow whenever he lied down, he would wake up and talk.
2006 Jul 3 Monday
We reached Philly early in the morning at 630 am and found that there was no place we could park our car on Ben Franklin parkway as it had been cordoned off for the independence day celebrations. We parked elsewhere, left prem to sleep in the car while we went home to have our bath and breakfast.
Madhu quickly cooked delicious vaangi-bath, later expressing that neither prem or mahendra had said anything about the food – just gorging it without any comment!! With not much time for parking we left Philly towards north Jersey shore of Sandy Hook.
Drove on I-295 and Garden state parkway to reach Sandy hook. Sandy hook is a hook like outcrop of land which juts out from the jersey coast. It lies south of Manhattan and Staten island with the gap in between forming part of the New York natural harbour system. Earlier, ship trying to get to the harbour would not be able to steer thru and would always crash; later a lighthouse was constructed on Sandy hook to aid navigation and is supposedly the oldest surviving lighthouse in the US.
A lot of beaches dot Sandy hook and we drove in search of one with no crowd, later finding that there would be none, with such a beautiful summer sun. We stopped at the lighthouse, saw the video show there and hit the beach. Played for a while in the water and then basking in the sun for a while. Madhu tried out her swimming skills, the doggie style she had learnt recently.
Lunch was at Seagull restaurant; with a scramble to search for my purse before which was lying under the seat found by madhu accompanied by scoldings about my carelessness. Beer and some good sea food at the place which overlooked the beach and the sea on either side. Mahendra called up nagi and raghu, imitating actor Dinesh’s voice. Nagi could not make out in the beginning. Prem tried to put on a voice while talking to raghu, but failed miserably. Raghu said that he could make out the voice of “dabba prem”.
We went back to the beach to play some more and then for some long sleep. Madhu and me walked along the beach, also running in the sand. A lot of fisherman who caught the fish for fun. Once hooked, they would unhook the bait and then throw the fish back into the sea. Invariably with the wound, the fish died of starvation and we saw evidence of it by the many fish lying dead by the shore. Tap! Tap! These fisherman are crazy!! I had come to Sandy hook about 2 years back with Anant from vidyashala – who to my surprise had taken me to a nudist beach saying he enjoyed it a lot – he had been one of the most conservative guys in vidyashala. Walking along the beach I realized we had reached this nudist beach and turned back with madhu showing irritation.
Back in the other beach I went to sleep with the sun harsh on our skins. There were huge house flies which bite much worse than a mosquito. They also had affinity towards dark skin, choosing to bite us rather than all the white skin around. Everyone lay in the beach having a sun bath, and we lay there covered in towels and bed sheet trying to escape the bites! Mahendra and prem walked towards the nudist beach as expected. They came disheartened ;-) saying there were only “gedde” people there. I have also seen that there are lot of clothed people in the nudist beach but most of them are from India.
We drove to Edison NJ, a veritable little India in the US with the largest concentration of Indian population, accompanied with unexpected u-turns in the middle of the road, and people waving their hands to stop the traffic like in hosur road ;-). We freshened at Prem’s house – which was cramped with a lot of engineers trying to make their dream in the US of A. Next stop was the Indian road where we had dinner. Once at a paki place and next at a Bombay chat place. We took tickets for the movie Krish – a copy of a lot of Hollywood movies like superman, paycheck, etc; with a huge dose of hindi masala and emotion. Prem was in awe of Hritik Roshan, like our Narada being in awe of Kamal Hasan. Many a times did we hear him say that hritik had such a nice body, such nice biceps; once even saying that his (prem’s) body was like hritiks’s lean and mean. Mahendra was mad at the movie; with an absolutely fantastic comment of “yaake ee thara science fiction and emotion mix maadiddare? Either science fiction or emotion sari iratittu”. The movie was an absolute bummer but we enjoyed pulling prem’s leg all thru it.
We picked prem’s fren after the movie and headed back home to Philly. A stop for the usual cigarette and then we were back in Philly. Prem drove back to NJ along with Mahendra.
2006 Jul 4 Tuesday
We slept until mid-day getting up at 3 pm. Madhu’s frens from Drexel called up about meeting in front of the art museum to see the fire works. There was the july 4th parade plus the company of the Drexel gang of Vinayak, Pilly, Harsha, Priya, Sapna and Giri. Giri vanished sometime in between, much to the chagrin of the group who called her a traitor.
Some songs by Lionel Ritchie, good ones but with not much enthu. Fireworks were brilliant with the backdrop of the museum and imminence of rain.
The Drexel gang had etched out a plan for the weekend. This time a short one day trip to Promised land state park with camping for the night.
Ended our Niagara trip with the plans and excitement of the next one.
Not wanting to miss the sunrise we headed towards the river at 430 am. Bad luck, the sun was up, but was hidden behind the clouds, so no view for us. However the river was breath-taking, it moves with such force here. Like Vishweswarrayya canal in KRS but a lot more wider. Walking along the river we reached 
everything except a goat had died here and hence the name. Some years back there was a paper mill on the island, but prudence had made the Americans destroy it. We walked along to the bridal veil falls and then onto the main attraction the horseshoe falls. Imagine a wide concave wall rising almost 10-15 stories high and almost .5-1 km across. It is a wide expanse, almost as wide as the boating lake pool in KRS. It is around 3/4th the height of the KRS dam. It curves much more than the KRS walls. Now imagine the whole of KRS water flowing over this curved wall, in one smooth motion with no gaps in between. At the top it is just 2-3 feet of falls cascading over the wall, but below you find it roaring in a misty falls. Such a beautiful sight. We had come here at 5-6 am in the morning, so there was no one around. We took a lot of photos realizing that such an opportunity of being able to take photos with no one around was a rare occurrence. We walked up to the bridal veil falls where you get very close to the water. There are steps at the bottom where you have a mist trail, close to the falls, and drenching you in the mist.
finding that the whirlpool ride on the niagara river was costly and ditched the idea of going there.
chicken and wanted to eat here. We found a lot of cars parked on the road side and on asking were told that there would be fire works on the other side of the lake. Excited we walked to the waters edge with our food. Soon the fireworks started. The July 4 fireworks with mountains as the backdrop, the lake in the front reflecting the moon light and the fireworks, and we on the edge of the lake sitting on a old wooden park bench with the water kissing softly near our feet. 
