What doesn't kill you, makes you only stronger...

Obama sure has taken strides towards mending relations with muslims, but the TSA hasnt received the memo yet.

This being my first arrival to a US airport under Obama administration, I was cautiously hopeful that August 2009 will mark a new chapter and a turning point in the troubled relationship that the TSA and I have had over the years. But just to be on the safe side, I took the usual precautions before arriving at the customs and immigration counter. On the customs' form where you are supposed to list the countries you visited prior to your arrival to US, I listed "saudi arabia", "lebanon", and "pakistan" in almost illegible form..sandwiched between countries that are viewed as being on friendly terms with US, such as UK, China, Thailand and Spain. Unfortunately, this elaborately crafted scheme came to a naught. TSA agent did end up reading "Saudi Arabia" and "Pakistan" and asked how long I stayed in each country. My customs form was stapled to my passport which really is just one small step for that TSA agent, but it ushers in a couple of hours of secondary checking process for me.

At the secondary checking counter, my "admissibility" qualifications were verified. A TSA agent then proceeded to protect the american way of life by checking the contents of my suitcase. One by one the contents were taken out and put on a desk - mini-statues, wooden carvings and mini-paintings that I had purchased from various places in the last 7 months. I had collected these in the hopes that some day a maiden with sculpted high-arched feet will join my solo-flight and value these possessions enough to display them tastefully in a glass case in our nest as a token of her love. But for now all these articles would be put in some corner of my apartment with a manly disregard, piled atop souvenirs from previous travels.

What doesnt kill you, makes you only stronger. Finding humor in despair makes it less of a despair. Nice words, but whichever way I spin it, I cannot get over the fact that I have to get "admissibility check" run on me before I am allowed to enter into my own home country. Nevertheless, its great to be back. It feels as if I have been in a noisy subway station for all these months and now suddenly there is silence all around. There are no honking cars, no street hawkers whose chants you can hear in your bedroom, no over crowded dwellings and parks and sidewalks. Just silence.

And perhaps going through "admissibility check" is a small price to pay for this priceless all around silence and quietness that is so unique to this vast country.