Law, Partially

Maybe one year is too long to take to plan a vacation. With so many weeks available to envision the trip, you get ideas like: I will document the entire trip in real-time on our blog. Also, let's make non-refundable hotel bookings because they're cheaper -- when we've planned so far ahead, what could get in the way of the trip? Almost two weeks into the London Linges' Great Adventure South, and I am writing the introductory entry that probably should have been written before leaving London. This fall, Christine, Bobby, and I all find ourselves in natural transition points. Christine just graduated from LSE; she's pregnant and unemployed. I agreed to move my consulting practice from London to Minneapolis and am (temporarily) unemployed in the meantime. Bobby, not yet tied down with a mortgage or state-mandated schooling obligations, goes where the trains and planes (and his parents) take him. His employment consists of going on adventures. We're already in Eu...

The last days in Chicago were spent in an Airbnb studio apartment in Wicker Park. Wicker Park is often called a "hipster" neighborhood, but the truth is something diagonal. In the 90s hipsters were moving in, and since then the young families and professionals have been pushing the true hipsters further afield, leaving perhaps commuting hipsters or moneyed hipsters. Nevertheless, despite the increasing wealth of the local citizens, there remain many "hip" stores and inexpensive and trendy restaurants. The neighborhood vibe will foreshadow our May trip to Portland, where the " dream of the 90s is still alive ." Our apartment was just off Milwaukee Avenue, where we dined up and down the street. We had ramen (Kizuki Ramen and Izakaya), Hawaiian (Mahalo), Mexico City-style comfort food (Fonda Frontera), hearty classic brunch (Bongo Room), sushi burrito (En Hakorre), expensive doughnuts (Stan's Donuts), New Haven style pizza (Piece Brewery & Pizzeri...

April ends with the FD Linges in Cedar Rapids and Chicago in temporary housing. Bobby did not like his 12 hour flight from Tokyo to Chicago. He slept most of first night back in Chicago. We arrived in Chicago the afternoon of Tuesday, April 11, and by Friday night he was more or less back on schedule. The period in between was terrible for all of us: Bob regularly woke up in the middle of the night and just cried and cried until he was hoarse. We needed him to get back on schedule. During the day I woke him up from his naps so that he wouldn't get too much sleep during the day. Baby jet lag is terrible. But after the heavy jolt of the time zone switch, I no longer had to bounce Bobby to bed. He's been falling to sleep on his own in his crib. Maybe he just wasn't sleeping well in Singapore. Or maybe he just got in the habit of being bounced to sleep when he was recovering from jet lag upon arriving in Singapore. But he didn't need it anymore once we were back. My...

Visiting Singapore means for us a lot of visiting with friends and family. With less than one week left in country, time was running out to see everyone. We were going to need to eat a lot of food and take a lot of bus, subway, and Uber rides, but we were committed. On Saturday we went to a Chen family dinner party. On Sunday we ate dim sum in an old school restaurant with an old friend. On Monday I drank craft beer, talked to ang mohs (white people), ate curry, and still made it home in time to put Bobby to bed. Along the way, I engaged in one of my hobbies: spying traces of an older Singapore. Sometimes it's hard to find such artifacts because this island is always tearing down and building new. Chen party Christine's cousin, Justin, hosted us on Saturday for dinner. Justin and I are buddies because we both stayed at the Chen household back in 2011 and 2012. He was saving up some money before striking off on his own by staying with his mom's brother, Mr. Chen. I was s...

As is apparent from some prior entries, I’ve become a wanderer. St. Louis, Columbia, Paris, New York, Michigan, Iowa, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Bombay, who knows where else will be next. I don’t like to let the grass grow under my feet. Running around the world is exciting, but part of me longs to stand still and settle in the Midwest. On the one hand, I’ve become real good at making friends – I mean, you always have to make new friends when you move to a new place. On the other hand, I have so many friends spread so far around, any of whom I may never see again. And in a few years I’ll leave these Pittsburgh friends behind too. I bought a book in Delhi written by the famous British explorer Sir Richard Burton – not the actor, but a man with a fascinating biography nonetheless ( link here - the first entry is not the same guy, but the rest are). Sir Richard was a wanderer in the first degree, exploring the entirety of India and Africa for the Queen. He also posed as a Muslim and snuck in...

This is a travel blog. Now I’m back in Pittsburgh. What I mean is, I am not traveling currently. So this blog is sort of on hiatus until I travel again and that travel experience is interesting enough to warrant blog entry. I do foresee a trip to New York City in October, and I also foresee a trip to the Seattle-Tacoma area around New Years. That trip would be to visit my good friend Josh, aka the MFG, an army man who just this summer began his station there. I sort of doubt much intellectual will happen there worthy of blogging. However, I’ll probably be going somewhere interesting next summer, but who knows where this place will be: London, Paris, Singapore, the afterlife. Namaste until then…

What was the number one highlight? Let’s say it was my trip to the villages around Latur. I gave a harrowing speech about the U.S. education system and how when there is no discrimination, children can study to become whatever they want to be: engineer, doctor, lawyer, pilot, astronaut. I also sang the Star Spangled Banner to a gathering of 25 village leaders, and yes, I fell flat on all the high notes. I was so drunk on my success with that song, I followed it up with Redemption Song by Bob Marley. I asked my CRY friends to tell the leaders in Marathi (the language the villagers understand) that Redemption Song is a song about the Jamaican people’s struggle. These village leaders were Dalits and embroiled in their own struggle – ie the struggle for basic human rights in their communities. And all weekend, the villagers treated me like the most revered celebrity. Maybe I will move out there for a short period of time – to write a report for CRY.

I don’t know if any Mariconians (as those who work for Marico fondly call themselves) will ever read this blog, but I’d like to throw a thank you their way. They gave me a desk, a computer, and a paycheck this summer to study whatever areas of Indian law fascinated me. I learned more than I expected to learn, not just about the whole of the Indian legal system, but some American law too. I exit India with a much greater love of the law than with which I entered India. And I wasn’t just learning Indian law, I was learning the entire Indian legal system as my Marico lawyer colleagues took me to the Bombay High Court, set me up with the senior advocate in Delhi (many thank yous also to Mr. Pratab – I hope to meet again someday) to set in on a session of the Indian Supreme Court, and all took time from their busy days to entertain my queries about Indian law and India. On my last day of work, knowing my fondness for that fat god with the elephant head who has a wife and rides a rat, my col...

To anybody who read the Indian portion of my blog and didn’t comment, thank you very much for reading. I didn’t think any of my law student comrades were reading because none were commenting. I was pleased and surprised to return to Pittsburgh and learn that a few had actually been following my mild adventures. I thought I had been forgotten about…

I’ve been back in the States for two weeks now. Some Indian reflections are in order. Consider this closure. I think I’ve done all the things in the States that I had been dreaming of all summer. I’m drinking red European wine and eating European cheese as I type. (American wine and cheese were also dreamed about, but it just so happens that I’m going European tonight.) These items are prohibitively expensive in India, but at Costco in the U.S., they’re just the right price. I ate Mexican food at El Maguey. I saw friends and family. I spoke English, and everyone understood. As I type this, I’m thinking, being back home sounds underwhelming, and actually it probably is. I have unfinished business, it feels, in India. Eleven weeks just wasn’t enough time. I was intimidated by India when I first arrived there. What shocked and scared me most at first was the madness of the streets. People were walking on highways. Also on highways there were roadside stalls set up. People didn’t stop at r...

This turned to be a pretty funny day, and I still shudder when I think how lucky I am I ended the day on a plane headed west. My last day in Bombay was Saturday. Friday night I stayed to work until 10:30pm trying to finish my work (especially since I had taken a 5 hour lunch break on Thursday with Christine). I even went in to work on Saturday morning, just to make sure my work was done enough. Actually, I have some significant portions to finish here in the States. I have no time for this, but I’ll make time. I was originally supposed to stay at Marico for another 4 weeks, back in those heady days where I thought I was traveling onward to Hong Kong from India. Had I stayed those 4 weeks, I would have finished more of my project. I am rather tired of Indian food, but just because I hadn’t eaten pav bahji very much and because it’s the last time I’ll have it in a while, I went to my office building’s cafeteria to get some pav bahji. Pav Bahji is a spicy tomato-based thick liquid eaten w...