chapter 15

MilwaukeeThe pressures of planning tours for visiting parents who are also semi-Luddites and helpless in a technology-driven country, working at his job and preparing for his interviews all at the same time had understandably made Amar a little absent-minded. The plan was to go to Milwaukee the next day and we reached the Appleton bus station in the Gary-driven Uber to find that Amar had booked tickets once again for Madison.The chirpy ‘hi’-ing woman at the counter pointed this out to Arpitha. As always, I stood by her side, a most ineffectual right-hand person. Arpitha insisted the booking was to Milwaukee. After some back and forth she understood who was responsible for the mix-up. Now the topic shifted to cancelling the tickets and re-booking.‘No cancellation possible, ma’am,’ the woman said, her smile fading.‘The bus to Milwaukee is moving,’ a young guy, leaving the office after getting his ticket, threw over his right shoulder, heaving his bag over his left. He looked pleased at having been the bringer of glad tidings.It had the desired reaction. We gave a collective start, and VK took position for the fifty-metre dash.‘You can take the next,’ the woman at the counter shrugged. I love the way Americans shrug their shoulders. They speak an entire language using them. ‘But no cancellation,’ she warned. It took a while for us to sort it out—for Arpitha to sort it out, rather. I just watched. The technological brouhaha was beyond me. If either of the active participants looked at me for confirmation, I’d nod, looking wise and then realise the nod was mistimed—I was actually undoing what Arpitha was trying hard to rectify. So I did the next best thing. I skipped to the loo.The lady was not for turning, and we didn’t really have a leg to stand on. How do you convince someone that you absentmindedly booked tickets to the same place you’d been to a couple of days back, and request a change of tickets to the right place instead?We ended up buying fresh tickets and once that was done the smile was back, dimples and all. She suggested, rather vaguely, that we could try later for an online reimbursement for the erroneous booking. What she probably wanted to say was, ‘Whether you do it now or later or never, whether you get anything at all is none of my concern. Now please get the hell out of here.’ No, I’m being uncharitable; she was rather sweet, actually. Anyway, Arpitha acted on her suggestion after we returned that evening. All to no avail. No refund, thank you.It was an actual Greyhound bus this time. Because of the confusion, by the time we got into the bus, the seats in front were already taken. So VK couldn’t get the driver’s life history out of him. He couldn’t get anything out of the person seated next to him either, for that happened to be me. I could give any self-respecting Trappist monk a run for his money when I’m on a moving bus or car. To keep travel sickness at bay, I become motionless and silent, concentrating with such keenness on the road ahead that it would put a secret service agent to shame.VK had to settle for his own thoughts and the absorbing scenes we passed all through the hour and a half the bus took to cover the hundred-mile distance. We were very fortunate to have travelled in a Greyhound bus, for, a few months after our visit, Greyhound shut down its bus service to northeast Wisconsin, leaving the roads to Amtrak and Lamers. For Wisconsinites, it was the end of an era.We managed a quick lunch at the Milwaukee bus station and choking over the strange combo sandwich I seemed to have ordered, we were off to Milwaukee’s much lauded natural history museum—the Milwaukee Public Museum. And no wonder, it richly deserved all those plaudits and more. This is a must-see museum and for me, the best among all we had visited so far, and there were quite a few jostling for the top spot.You succumb to ‘A Sense of Wonder’ when you climb the wide staircase to the first floor and a magnificent skeleton of a humpback whale, in the company of a huge number of other rare worthies, greets you. Skeletons aren’t exactly calculated to inspire rhapsodies. But this one is special. The museum boasts of a mindboggling number of singular artefacts, but its chief attraction lies in its dioramas—exhibits that are full-size or miniature models. From dioramas that depict the geological history of Wisconsin when it started out as a shallow sea to a representation of the streets of old Milwaukee, from startlingly realistic scenes of life in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas to guiding you through the ancient civilisations, from taking you for an awesome glimpse of ocean life to encouraging a stroll through rain forests, it is a jaw-dropping experience.At the replica of a typical English village, VK realised his childhood dream—to ride on an actual penny farthing. Well, not completely, for he could only sit on it, it being fixed to the ground, but he could pretend to pedal it and that was good enough.This time we were able to meet Amar without any problem at the rendezvous decided upon—outside the art museum.‘Let’s go for a walk,’ said Amar who wanted to stretch his long legs. Our legs had been well stretched to thin, spindly appendages by all that walking in the museum, but before Arpitha or I could suggest a short break, VK whipped open the map of Milwaukee and the enthusiastic father-son duo went ahead, the map flapping into their faces, taking byways and turns according to its dictates, bumping into people and apologising instead of saying, ‘Hi! Great way to meet you.’ We trotted after them to the Historic Third Ward in Downtown Milwaukee to soak up some history.It was almost like the walk at Dubai airport; we had no idea when it would end. Just when I felt I had enough history in me for two generations, they stopped and waited till we caught up with them. When I approached, Amar announced, ‘Let’s go back.’‘All the way back?’ I panted.‘We have to; the car’s parked there.’How I longed for an autorickshaw that we could flag down by the simple act of stretching a hand, and paying the driver in cash when we reached our destination. My friend Sumi’s niece, Ansu, who lives in the U.S., loves the autorickshaw so much, it is the main reason she’s enthusiastic about a visit to India. The moment she gets here, she clamours for a ride in the ‘Indian car’—her name for the auto. Oh, Americans, you don’t know what you’re missing. At that moment, I knew pretty well what I was missing.We took off on the return marathon and reached the finish line at our limping best, tongues hanging out.‘We’re going to Bollywood,’ Amar said as we crawled into the car.‘Bollywood?’ I was in no mood for a movie. ‘A restaurant,’ he grinned. I groaned, expecting a garishly lit place, loud Hindi songs, dashing waiters and heavily made-up waitresses. But there was nothing glamorous about Bollywood Café, and a good thing too, for after all that time in the museum, only dinosaurs would have interested me. But the chicken was decent.