Mall of America, American babies and women

I woke up a little late today, but just in time to not miss my flight – was amongst the last people to board. Minneapolis is cold! When you look down from the airplane, you see a white landscape. Stepping out of the airport I could see ice all over – Cars in parking lots were covered with ice/snow. Thankfully, I did not have to spend much time in the cold. The meeting with the client went off well. It was funny, over a dozen people turned up for the meeting from the client side – and most hardly knew each other – they were from different divisions of the company. It is interesting to be in a meeting that has people from different divisions of a company. Each has his/her own agenda, and all questions/concerns raised are entirely around their issues. I guess ISB did a good job of educating us on this. Overall, things went well. Interestingly, some of the issues raised here were similar to what Ranjit tells me about the tussle between his company and the retailers there, and also the ones we faced with mobileuncle.

Was free by 4 PM. As I had 3 hours before the flight back to Austin I decided to drop by to the ‘Mall of America’ (yep that’s what they call it). The mall is huge – I guess something like the one they have in Chennai – maybe a little bigger (ok a lot bigger). But it’s mostly like any mall in India – the only difference being the size of stores – they are huge; and the number of people- there are very few. Center of the mall was like appu ghar in Delhi – water slides, ghost chambers etc. I guess this section is dedicated to Snoopy (the peanuts guy).

While in the elevator in the mall, I saw these two American babies in trams. Now these firang babies are real cute. They are fat, smiling, don’t make a sound, and don’t give a shit about people around them – they are in a world of their own. Coming to think of it, as I had heard from people earlier, babies here don’t cry, cars don’t honk and dogs don’t bark (well… whatever of dogs there are – only pets, and they are all kept as well, if not better, than any human baby). I think the only painful creatures in this country are teens – they kindda are irritated with their parents around. (Ok, I haven’t seen enough to make a statement like that, but then what the hell, this is my blog – I can pass judgments.) I guess that is the case with any teen anywhere in the world, but here there is more visible display of disgust. Coming to think of it, teen is the age of rebellion – we all have had our share of it.

An interesting observation about women here: young women are well kempt and pretty (yes, in every flight that I take, there are atleast 1-2 women that would give any super model a run for their money). Infact, even if you walk on the streets, you are sure to find more than a handful of them that you just have to give a second glance – bloody lucky Americans!! However, most married women are fat and extremely untidy. I wonder how this comes about –is it that beautiful girls prefer to stay unmarried, or do they keep pretty to find a husband?