The Systems and Practices Continued... (Driving Test)

A warm welcome to the sequel post. Actually I should have given the title like "Systems and Practices - II" like "American Pie - I, II, III" etc. Or something like "Matrix returns". Any ways, the title itself is boring so I did not want to make it more boring. But trust me, I'll try to keep this post also as interesting as possible.

After clearing the KT (Knowledge test) I went to the officer and asked him what to do next? He just asked me whether I had cleared the KT? I said yes! And for a second I realized that even if I would have flunked in my test I could have gone ahead and given the driving test! But I was safe, I had really cleared it and I was happy. Then I moved on to the another token number machine which was supposed to be waiting number for scheduling the driving test. I waited for another hour. I was feeling that the stories heard in India about Patience test before the driving test are coming true! but that was not the case. Finally my turn came, the officer told that the full month was booked for the tests and I had an option of choosing the other test center than Bellevue which is my hometown for now. I was really desperate for the License as the Insurance agency had already sent me the warning letter for submitting my Driving License number. And thus I was running short of time. So I went ahead and said 'yes' to the Seattle Driving test center. This center was 20 miles away from my home, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. But I had to accept it. Then I came home with victory on my face and one week later date at Seattle center.

Before going for the test, I had consulted my colleagues regarding the test and had taken some guidelines. Trust me, they threatened me more than the Driving test officer. They told me hell lot of things about the rules... Do this... Do not do this... and what not... Still I was trying to keep my confidence intact.

And finally the day came. I woke up early and took my roomie with me for the test and marched ahead for the test 2 hours before scheduled time. With the help of pathetic GPS device,( which was really not pathetic, but I was not capable enough that time to handle it) we started on the road to Seattle. I was showing as if I am fully confident. And off course I was. It's been now around 12 years since I am driving in India. Finally we reached the DOL office. I was scheduled at 3:00 PM in the afternoon. It was a rainy day. Just before my test time it started raining. And we were waiting for the instructor in the car. He finally arrived and started with some other person. I was observing him what he is asking for. I was making sure that I was complying with the requirements. He went ahead and tested the other person. I had no chance to know what was the result as he never came back and parked in the same test parking lot again. I was partly afraid to see the situation and to see my turn next.

At last, he came to me and greeted me. I also did greet him well. The instructor was a classic tall, thin old person with a hat and he started asking for my Passport/VISA, insurance etc. He checked all the things thorougly and then asked me to show the indication of left turn, stop and right turn with my hands. I did it well without fail. Then he asked me to turn on indicators as needed. Then he asked me to apply breaks and he went back and checked for the break lights. And the time came... You must be thinking this was just a routine check up and was not something serious. But trust me, it was something serious. The middle tail lamp which is a small lamp inside the rear window glass was not working!!! All other tail lights were in perfect condition. He went a bit away from me and the car and asked my friend to come along and he explained the situation and he finally told that the Vehicle is not fit for the test!!!!!! And I was going crazy to know this. I kept cool and had a chat with my friend regarding how to fix it, where to fix it and when we can re-arrange the test. The old man guided us and finally told us that I need to go to the DOL office and once again need to reschedule the test. OMG (Oh my god) I said. I did not want to wait again in the bloody Q for another hour. But there was no other go, I convinced myself that whatever happens, happens for good. This was the end of the first driving test story.

After a couple of days, I went again to the office and rescheduled my test. This time the officer was kind enough to listen to my situation and gave me nearest possible date at Bellevue center. I was once again waiting for the day. Days passed on and the final Big day arrived. I decided to go alone this time, so even if something bad happens its not in front of my friend.(Though my friend is very co-operative and understanding.) I arrived at the DOL office. I had really become an expert in driving on USA roads because of the time gap. But my confidence level was oppositely proportional to it!!! You can understand my situation after such a nice experience of last time. It's needless to mention that I took care of the "Middle" tail lamp this time along with some other un-necessary fixes and had spent some money on it (Offcourse in $$$$!!!).

The same things happened today also. I was keeping calm and waiting for the instructor for test drive. To my surprise, this was a lady inspector this time... Hold on... Do not imagine some crazy stuff... She was not a blonde or something. She was a perfect old, strict (Khadus) lady who came and sat besides me on the right side. Yeah, in US the cars are left hand driven. (I think all of us know this ;) ) She started exactly the way she was supposed to. This time I was so much frustrated that when she asked me to show right turn indicator with my hands, I showed exactly opposite. She asked me 3 times to do the same and all the time I repeated the mistake. I was going crazy. I was not under my control. Finnally she nodded her head and indicated me that I was doing wrong. At last attempt, I realised it and was ashamed of myself. I did the right signals in that attempt and then she went ahead and checked for other things in car. This time all the things were fine, expect me- myself. I was very nervous. She sat on the right front seat and asked me to back of the car and take out from the parking. I was vey careful while doing any smallest thing. I was taking all due care. She took me to the parallel parking slot and asked me to do the parallel parking in between 4 poles. I tried my level best to do so with all precaution. Then she asked me to take out the car and go for the road test. We marched towards the main road, where the speed limit was of 25 MPH. I was driving very carefully. I showed all hand signals, stopped at stop signs, parked by the curb and did all the tricks necessary to satisfy her. (I mean the driving test needs.) We arrived back and my heart was pounding as if I had committed some crime and got busted by Police. She gave a bad look at me and declared the result. Any guess on my results...??? I was also not sure about myself. By this time, you must have started feeling pity about me... Isn't it true? Yes, she continued... The passing score for the test to give you the license is 80 out of 100. And Mr. Pranav you have scored 84. So you are eligible for the license.
But, you must take care of following things... I sighed out of relief... She continued and showed me my faults that were committed by me our of nervousness. She told me that I was not up to the mark in Parallel parking, I drove good at some times, but I was more concious at times and comitted some small mistakes. She showed me the results sheet where she had all the observations. At the end she told me that most of times I drive with one hand and I need to change that habit of keeping one hand on gear stick. (I said in my mind, Madam please come to India some time and then I'll show what driving the car means. Apani gali me to kutta bhi sher hota hai... I have been driving for 10-11 years and how could she expect me to leave my habits... Off course this was said in my mind by my expert driver's EGO... But it was of no use.) I finally said, enough lecture (In my mind). mam, could you please tell me what to do next...? She just told me to park the car and proceed to the office and wait. Finally after a week I got my 1st United states driving License- the Washington State Driving License.

Till date I am driving with all my pride though I passed with border score in the test. I have become much much safer driver than before. Once I come back to India you will observer this difference at least for couple of months till I get acustomed to the screwed up driving conditions in India, espacially Pune. Still I love Pune, and I love my India....

The systems and practices

Hi all once again... Finally i found some time from my busy routine and I am back. :) In this post I would like to share my experience at MS (Microsoft) premises and another experience at Driver's licensing office.

One fine day, (it was really a sunny day) I was late for the office as usual. And after getting up stairs on the 3rd floor I was about to settle down with the laptop and other accessories. Suddenly, the Fire alarm started blowing. We were wondering what type of sound is that? Then some one came and told us to evacuate the building. We thought the building has caught the fire! All of us came down using the Stairs. The use of lifts is prohibited! And people really follow the rules. :) Everyone was relax, no panic in spite of such a serious situation. We came out and we settled in the parking lots on the road side. We were observing what's going on! In 2-3 minutes the Fire Brigade, POLICE and ambulance arrived at the premises. This is the beauty of the 911 system. In case of emergency you just call 911 and all the emergency services will arrive within 5 minutes, I bet on that!

After half an hour all of us were wondering, what has really happened? There were no symptoms of fire/smoke or any thing else! Still the whole drama was happening. Then after half an hour waiting all of us concluded that it was a "Fire Drill" practice :)) And finally after such a nice time pass (as it was not expected!) we had to get back to work and push hard for whole day work! :(

The second nice(?) experience was the Driver's License experience. Being an experienced driver in India, I was very confident about my driving. (Though I was afraid of driving car on free ways! ;)) so i drove the car for few days with my Indian driving License. Then for getting the Insurance I was supposed to get the WA-Driver's license. i.e. Washington state driver license. I thought that would really be a nice process... and it really turned out to be a life time experience. There are 2 stages of getting license. I am not going in details of the whole process... The interested readers can get detailed information here. So... first stage was to clear "The knowledge test" which I passed with 20 out of 25 marks. Now some one might think, what's so big in that? The real hack was that I had to study for whole week about the driving rules, which is present in the form of book. Then you have to face the objective Q's exam with 25 Questions and the options are really tricky. Some questions contain actual figures too! And the most interesting fact is that the passing score for this test is 80% i.e. 20 out of 25 which I got :) The technique to solve this test is that you keep the difficult questions last to solve. There were 5 -7 difficult/confusing questions! And out of remaining 18-20 questions I already had committed 2 mistakes!!! Then the real situation was there... I still had 3 more wrong answers at my disposal and 7 more tough questions... So I had to answer at least 4 Q's correctly... I was really feeling like the India - Pakistan 1 day cricket match! The last over and 9 runs needed...

I answered 2 more questions correctly. So the equation was 5:3. Then I went wrong for 2 more alternate Questions... now the situation was getting worse... the proportion was 3:1 i.e. 3 questions remaining and i can answer only 1 question wrong... The next Question... ( I am avoiding the details of Q's to make this post short and sweet!) It went correct! 2:1 Hurray....... I was literally jumping in front of the computer screen... Oh i forgot... everything is automated here, and so the KT was! So... I was having 2 more questions and 1 wrong answers. The next question went wrong... I felt as if i played a dot ball!!! and the situation was the most critical on the last question! 1:0 which meant that I had to answer this correct otherwise I'll have to spent more $25 for another attempt after 7 days! Oh my god... i said.... I remembered god once and tried to answer the last question! last ball and 4 runs required... Now, you can imagine as it was the last question, it was the toughest and most tricky question.. Some how I gathered all my courage, knowledge and experience and finally clicked on the answer....

And Imagine what happened???????????? I will tell you this in my next post.... :)

Feeling like the Indian Saas bahu serial??? Well, I dont like them at all... So, without keeping it any more suspense I tell you... This was the most exciting experience of my life... $25 = 1000 Rs. still the calculations were going on!!!!! I did not want to spend that much again... And finally... finally... the screen flashed!!!!! "Your score is: 20" You answered 5 questions wrong... You may now proceed to the Next driving test...

Guys, I am taking you leave for now... I have to get back to work. I promise you, I'll complete the story in the next blog post for sure!!! :) till then, good bye, take care and have a wonderfull moments... Stay in touch...

First look continued...

In my last post I talked a lot about the differences. Now the similarity I found in the Credit card experience was amazing... The credit card companies make a fool out of you as efficiently as the Indian Credit card companies! Yes! With their interest rates, hidden charges, attractive offers containing hidden charges, so on and so forth... Believe me folks, I have always been a great fan of the Credit cards, all my good friends know my credit history in India :) And the same story continues in US too... :) I have now learned how to say "NO" to the credit card customer care executives though :) I only have 1 credit card now. I have always been advising all my friends to have credit cards, if they have patience to track your own transactions and if they have guts to fight back in case of any disputes...

In first few months only I was a victim of one such case. Some XYZ company got my credit card details and after my realization of fruitlessness of the offer made to me, I called the customer care support and canceled my order. But in spite of the cancellation, the company kept on charging me some bucks (intentionally?) I filed a case of dispute against the company and the charges were reverted immediately. The episode repeated once again this month also. Finally, I after calling both the companies and the bank couple of times, I got rid of the bills.

In continuation with the same topic here are some more "systems" I mentioned in my last post...

• The traffic flows in exactly opposite direction. :)

• Lane rules are followed very very strictly.

• Honking ( Blowing the horn) is strictly prohibited unless and until extremely necessary :) I still remember the Sinhgad road and Karve road and the traffic in Pune, blowing loud horns all the way... I am wondering right now, how will I be able to survive in this situation once I come back to India! ( Hahaha, Don't worry, I am kidding. I have not yet become an American! :))

• The roads, the lanes, the over bridges, multi storied bridges are built with extreme intelligence and planning!

• The roads here are normally numbered than naming. e.g. I am living on 148th AVE NE. i.e. a main road with number 148. in the North east direction. The cross roads are known as streets. e.g. NE 40th St etc. This is just a general rule. Because, you can still find the roads with names like madison St, Lake AVE etc. in the downtowns.
  

• A downtown is a planned city center where there are many business towers and shopping malls and shopping places around along with few high profile residential places around.

OK. This much is good enough for today. Talk to you all in the next post... Till then good bye and take care... Please leave your opinions about the blog. I would like to hear from you!

The first look...

Before coming to the USA ("the" before "USA" is a must!) I was wondering, how will be my experience? How the cities in America look like? Are the people really friendly there? How will be my first on-site experience, so on and so forth. Nothing new. Everyone who gets a chance to roam around the world for what so ever opportunity always wonders this way for the first time.

Now, I have already completed a stay of 7+ months here in the United States. So just thought of putting all the observations,experiences and the differences between India and America together in this series of blogs. So the blog title: India Vs America.

So... to get started with a Disclaimer: I would like to hereby declare that all the thoughts and opinions expressed in this blog series are my personal perceptions and opinions, you may agree or disagree with some/many/all of them :)

How did I decide to note down all the points? I was here in Jan 08. It was a winter here in Seattle. All cold outside, and just after a week after my arrival, I experienced a heavy snow fall. So, the thing came to my mind that I should note down these all differences and experiences. Any ways, enough background for now. Coming to the topic, the first and foremost difference I noticed was the Weather! It's so much of a contrast out here!!! Right now, its hot outside my home. Around 25 degrees i.e. 77 degree Fahrenheits! Yes! You guessed it right... The temperatures are measured in Fahrenheits. This was really something new initially. Now a days, I always talk in "Fahrenheits" even if I talk to my dad! The reason I said there is a huge contrast is because when I landed here in Seattle, it was drizzling and the temperature was around 35-40 deg F. i.e. around 2-4 degree Celsius. More interesting fact about weather is, it rains for around 9 to 10 months round the year. And the remaining months are so called the "SUNNY" days!

Without changing the context, the next difference I would like to mention is the other measurement Units. The Fahrenheit is not the only difference! The distance is measured in Miles,feet inches, Weights in Oz (Ounce) and Lb (Pounds), Volumes in Gallons and fluid ounces, Speeds in MPH and last but not the least the currency in Dollars $$$ :) Thank god, the time is measured in Seconds, minutes and hours universally. :)

The whole system of units and measurements drove me nuts in my initial days. Right now I have become an expert in FPS and SI system and the conversion. ( With my converter utility in the cell phone! :))

The next thing I would like to talk about is the US itself! Why America is a developed country? I always used to wonder. I got the answers slowly as I got acquainted with the systems out here. The US itself is a huge system consisting of many systems. Let it be a traffic control system, licensing system, Social Security Number system (called "SSN" OR "Social" only) or even take an example of the road crossing system for the pedestrians! There are many systems working efficiently for the betterment of a citizen's life. Yes! The government of United States cares the most for their citizens. The SSN is a first and foremost thing that you need to apply for after you become a permanent/temporary resident of the States. This is your social security number used to track your financial, social and other transaction through out the time period for which you are staying in US. The funny thing here is, the better the credit history, better your status! I observed this strange situation for the first time in my life. In India, the person who has got least debts and highest assets is called as a person with good social and financial status. It's not the case in the US. So, as a part of the process, I went ahead and started with my bank account. After getting the SSN, I was eligible for the "Secure" Credit card. The Secure Credit card is a card issued by the bank with the baking of your own money! i.e. If I deposit $1000 towards my creidt card then I get the credit line of $1000 against it! So funny.... Isn't it? They are creating my credit history with my own money! This thing goes on for an year and then it gets tracked via SSN and the Credit History regulations etc. After an year, they increase the credit line depending on my track record! Really interesting process...

Any ways, once again coming back to the subject, I would like to continue with the same topic... But in my next post... Till then take care and have a nice time folks!!!