When I moved from India to US, I used to live in beautiful Newark, NJ. In Newark all shops (mainly dollar stores), restaurants (mainly Chicken Places), coffee shops (Dunking Donuts) used to close by 6 PM. The only place open used to be this "fine" Irish Pub that would stay open till 11 PM (we knew that is was 10:45 when the bar owner would yell "Last call folks - you cannot go home but you cannot stay here"). I therefore started frequenting it regularly. The clients used to be mainly Cops, FBI, Firefighters, local Irish politicians, and a smattering of graduate students from Rutgers. 
During that time I used to be only Indian in that place (this always surprised me since Newark was home to NJIT and I know a lot of Indians did their MS there - oh they were geeks, answered my own question...back to the story). Over time they started acknowledging me and when business was slow, the owner (Bill Scully) would sit and talk to me. I explained about India - the culture, life, politcs etc and he was genuinely interested. But for some reason he could never remember my name.
So one day this girl I used to hang out with comes to bar looking for me. She asks the owner if he has seen me. Bill told her he doesn't know who she was talking about. She described me to Bill (In my mind I think it was tall, dark, brooding, scholar, handsome young lad). Bill nods and proclaims "Oh! You mean Sean Murphy. Fine Irish lad he is"
The next minute, i walk into the bar and as I soon as I opened the door all patrons yell "Sean Murphy". I proceed to turn around to let the Irish man walk into the door and seeing no one I turn back. They all tell me that Scully told them my story - Indian orphan, washed ashore in as basket, loving Irish doctor couple adopt me and name me Sean Murphy.
To this day (it has been 9 years) when I go to Newark they all know me as Sean Murphy. The sad part is they know more about my "Irish" heritage than I do.
During that time I used to be only Indian in that place (this always surprised me since Newark was home to NJIT and I know a lot of Indians did their MS there - oh they were geeks, answered my own question...back to the story). Over time they started acknowledging me and when business was slow, the owner (Bill Scully) would sit and talk to me. I explained about India - the culture, life, politcs etc and he was genuinely interested. But for some reason he could never remember my name.
So one day this girl I used to hang out with comes to bar looking for me. She asks the owner if he has seen me. Bill told her he doesn't know who she was talking about. She described me to Bill (In my mind I think it was tall, dark, brooding, scholar, handsome young lad). Bill nods and proclaims "Oh! You mean Sean Murphy. Fine Irish lad he is"
The next minute, i walk into the bar and as I soon as I opened the door all patrons yell "Sean Murphy". I proceed to turn around to let the Irish man walk into the door and seeing no one I turn back. They all tell me that Scully told them my story - Indian orphan, washed ashore in as basket, loving Irish doctor couple adopt me and name me Sean Murphy.
To this day (it has been 9 years) when I go to Newark they all know me as Sean Murphy. The sad part is they know more about my "Irish" heritage than I do.
1 comment:
That's all well and good but tell 'em about Being Uber...
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