Cross Country - 1000 miles and racing ahead

Day 2 - 07 March

Part I

Hola from Interstate 70! In way of interesting trivia (directly pulled from wikipedia), this highway is the oldest highway project in the US. It also boasts of being home to Eisenhower Tunnel which, at over 11000 ft, is the highest point on the US interstate network. However, we are giving the tunnel a pass on this trip. Maybe next time...

This morning we paid our dues to Lord Venkateshwara at the S.V Temple at Pittsburgh. I usually make my annual visit to the temple on my birthday every year to make my mother happy. This trip had a whole other ulterior motive- "Please get me a job. Oh Pretty please...". What else do you expect from a yet to be employed, potentially unemployable MBA student? Au contraire, Arun beats me hands down in the piousness realm. He's actually been to this temple 5 times already and has been to 5 other temples in the US. Even I didn't know of this devout little soul hiding in him. We felt like we were back home in Chennai, with all the colorful Indian clothes and the air full of Tamil and Telegu words.

Pittsburgh SV Temple

Part II

Hi again from Interstate 70! We took a detour to Purdue University to meet a friend of mine from undergrad. We got an express tour of Purdue. We saw a cursed tower under which students refuse to walk before exams. We saw the Purdue lions which spout out water that students anoint themselves with before exams. Talk about superstition!

Old university buildings have so much character indeed. It looked like it was going to rain, so Arun rather uncharacteristically didn't bother with his camera. After a delicious Mexican dinner at Don Pablo's we hit the road again and are on our way to St. Louis where we will halt tonight and walk around tomorrow. It's supposed to rain in the morning. We are hoping we can still go ahead with our plans.

The 3 hour drive so far has been really interesting and rather challenging. For about an hour after we left Purdue it rained cats and dogs. We had to take a two-way state highway with visibility of about 10 meters. I drove in the rain for half hour before the rain Gods came down on me with renewed vengeance. So I handed the wheel over to Superman here. But I must admit the adrenalin rush was kind of fun...

And the best part! As we write this, the trip meter clocked the 1000th mile. We're about 25% of the way there. Yippie!!!