Last month, I went to Las Vegas with some of my friends. Las Vegas is the big, shiny, night city of money, glamour and sins in the state of Nevada. They say “what you do in Las Vegas, remains there”. Also called as the city of the sins, Las Vegas is located right in the middle of the desert in the state of Nevada. This city sleeps in the day time and at night starts its hunt for the new victims of desire. The roads get full with people, the buildings start shining brightly with lights, as if to allure people with their colors. The casinos start their earnings from where they left the yester night, the performers get ready for a long night ahead and the gamblers get ready with their new tactics to gather some fortune from this city of sins.
May 13, 2006 was just another night. We reached Las Vegas in the evening, after getting refreshed we started our walk on the famous strip. This is the main road in Vegas, and almost all of the well known casinos are located here. We saw the Bellagio fountain show, and then decided to go to the Eiffel tower in Paris-Paris casino. One of my very close friends from India was with us and another friend flew from Texas to Vegas just to be with us for some hours. It was truly a great time for all three of us, meeting in US after a long, long time. After some time of strolling on the strip, everyone got hungry. So we decided to take a break and have some food. But the city of Vegas is so alluring that you tend to think about dinner-time as a waste of time, and hence we all decided that me and Rohit will go and get some food for everyone while others continue with some other casinos. Deciding this, Rohit and me started our walk to the nearest McDonalds, not knowing what is awaiting for us there.
It was a typical scene inside the McDonalds, just like any other McDonalds. Everyone was enjoying the food, and recharging themselves for the long night ahead. We were just about to give our order, when we heard 3-4 big gun-shot sounds. And the whole picture changed all of a sudden. Before we understood what was going on, we found ourselves full of panic and on our knees right in front of the door. Lots of people were running inside, most of them trying to find a shelter to stay safe. Unfortunately, we did not have any place to run or hide, we were stranded there, right in front of the counter, just hoping and praying God for our lives. I will always remember how drastically the scene changed, in a flash of a second; the liveliness inside McDonalds was substituted with the fear. I guess it must be the same feeling a group of deer’s might be experiencing while drinking water on a calm lake and suddenly the lion attacks them.
Numbed by the sound of the gun shots and the fear in the air, I and Rohit tried to stay calm and telling ourselves that everything will be fine soon. But the situation was so tense, that I don’t exactly remember what was I thinking at that time. The only thought that came to my mind first was that now someone will walk into McD’s and say “Folks, don’t try to act too smart, you are all hostages, and you will not be released until the government frees one of our friends currently locked up in Alcatraz”..haha..!! I think this was the influence of too much of movie watching. But believe me, this was exactly what I felt at that moment. And coincidently even Rohit felt the same thing, so we decided to move out of that place as fast as possible, it was a totally speechless agreement and we started running out of the restaurant almost at the same time. Thinking about it now, I feel that it was actually a mistake because we were running in the direction from where we actually heard the gun-shots. But sometimes one has to follow the instincts, and that’s exactly what we did at that time. Both of us ran so very fast, probably that was the fastest I have ever run in my life so far.
After getting out of McDonalds, we went into a Denny’s and ordered food there. While sitting there, still thinking about how close we were to getting shot, we both were speechless. Thanking God for saving us and getting over the fear, we stopped in Denny’s for some time. Situations like this make us understand how fragile the human life is, and how vulnerable we all are. One bullet fired from some one’s gun, whether intentionally or accidentally is enough..!! Unlike the video games, we get only one chance in life and we better utilize it in the right way.
That evening in Las Vegas taught me a lot of things.
Past two years in USC have been the best years in my life so far. These years changed me a lot; I made lot of new friends, and some very close friends in these years. We had lot of fun in our house at 2618, Ellendale place as well as 851,23rd Street. Lot of fun, lot of music and a lot of learning too. Today while seating alone at home, I remember those days when we used to cook in our tiny kitchen, used to fight over whose dishes and spoons are left in the sink still to be washed, and whose stuff is lying in chaos in our small hall. I wonder what the house would have thought if it would have had a mind. I wonder why is it so difficult to just forget about things in our past and move on.
