A Pilgrimage to America (ePub)

From a remote 1960s dusty village of India, a young man in his early twenties suddenly and unexpectedly lands in the USA as a foreign student. He struggled for many years in the US with all the difficulties many immigrants go through.

He has observed America going through the turbulent times of the Vietnam War, 1960s riots and the changing times of the 1970s and onwards.

After graduating as a chemical engineer, he arrives in Houston. He is jobless, has little cash, does not know anyone in Houston, and does not know where to spend his first night. He struggles in Houston trying to get any labor job. He moves from place to place: From a rundown hotel to sharing an apartment with strangers, to a dilapidated house in a dangerous neighborhood, to a cheap boarding house, and again sharing an apartment with more strangers. He can't find even a menial job. He is down to his last ten dollars when he accidentally finds a warehouse laborer job.

He is almost deported by immigration but manages to stay legally in the US.

For three and half years after graduation, he works several odd jobs and interacts with various lower levels of the American class. This was not the America he had heard of in India.

He has failed in dozens of attempts to land an engineering job. Finally, in desperation, he dares to take a humiliating, low-paying trainee job just to get his feet in an engineering company's door. This strategy works, as he eventually gets his first engineering job there.

He describes various unusual experiences of his modest but successful 31-year career in the same company. Then he risks his career and becomes a successful consultant for the next eleven years and retires.

Happily married, he has two daughters and four grandchildren, and has fulfilled the American dream.

In the last few chapters, he adds unique family anecdotes, memories, and personal experiences of growing up in a large family in India. He writes about how his elder siblings influenced and changed his life.

He has distinct memories of growing up as an extremely skinny boy in an exceptionally large well-to-do family. He recalls not seeing any dentist until he is in his late twenties and celebrating his birthday for the first time at the age of 29.