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This is one of my personal musings in continuation to the Consultant’s wife series on my blog! You may chose to ignore or you may read to humor yourself.

 

 

After a five months stint in Dubai, a few weeks with me in Delhi, my consultant husband is on his flight mode yet again.  Last week he flew to Johannesburg, the largest city in South Africa, also the provincial capital of Gauteng province. He wasn’t very excited because this wasn’t his first visit to Joburg. Last year, he had already been there for two months. But yes, this time the 14 degree temperature in the days and lower in the nights is a first time for him. And I must say he is quite enjoying the chill in the African air. Who wouldn’t if you got a break from the scorching summers of Delhi?  While my man is reading this, I am sure he is saying this. ‘I wish it was all so hunky dory’!

 

 

 

 

Well, the fact is that his travels are not like mine but on the contrary, he spends days and night neck-deep in work. This time his challenging project is already giving him sleepless nights and there are days when I add to his fury. I just hate the time gaps that come with his assignments and when I am not able to connect with him, I crib and complain giving him a really hard time. Trust me, it isn’t easy to handle a wife who hates the traveling part of her husband’s job. After four years of our marriage, I am yet to accept the fact that if you marry a consultant, you got to cope up with his absence, quite often. Everything about my life feels unsettled the moment M is gone from the city. If you have been reading my blogs, you know that I have confessed about this earlier too.

 

 

 

 

 

Today is one of those days. Why? So the plan was that husband will go to Jo’berg and I will join him in a fortnight. Since I have never traveled to Africa, I have been really really excited about it. Last year, when he was there, I had to give it a miss because I had broken up my ankle. So in the last few weeks,  I have been happily chalking out my travel plans and making my itinerary. I was working on some collaborations too and taking it all one by one.  When M scheduled his flight for last Sunday, I was sad but I did not cry like always. I told him I would join him soon. But now when I am applying for the visa, I am not sure if this is happening soon. There is so much paper work to do and some of the people who have recently traveled to Jo’berg have told me that its almost taking more than 15 days to get the visa processed. I am all the more heart broken because its clashing with other travel plans too. Suddenly, a lot of things have gone haywire and I am super tensed.

 

 

 

 

 

To add to my fury, one of my relatives called me today and yet again she repeated the same ‘So where is M these days? When she got to know that he was away, she came up with a follow up, ‘So how long will this interesting long distance marriage continue?’ On the normal days, it wouldn’t have affected me much but today I was feeling low and I almost broke down. The simple reason was that I was already missing M. Moreover because my visa processing has yet not begun.  Some of the papers needed for it required corrections and I have to re-do them. We do not have a marriage certificate too and I had to get the marriage affidavit done. A lot of things have been going wrong and then suddenly I am surrounded by doubts, whether this trip is happening or not. I so want it to happen.  I have been lusting to do Africa for few years now. 

 

 

 

When I told M about the negative vibes and how everything was going wrong, clash of the dates, visa papers and more, he laughed it away. When my general rant began that he does not miss me and its only me,  he only had to say, ‘You are a traveler and you will travel, so just don’t worry’.

In fact he was super quick to add that he was missing me and Delhi food both. As Punjabi and a big foodie would have it, I knew food would definitely find a place in his conversation. He sweetly said that I am already exploring places for you so that when you are here, you can blog about it. I was both happy and surprised to hear this. I asked him ‘Really’? Please prove it…

Next, he sent me the picture below captioning it ‘Sending my love from Johannesburg’ and I couldn’t stop laughing.  My Punjabi boy will be a Punjabi boy wherever he goes. Being a vegetarian, he definitely finds his desi food in whichever part of the world he is in. After sending the picture he also told me that he can write a restaurant review for me if I want.  I am sure you guessed my answer. I said, let me come first then we will go there again. Review will come later.   😉

 

 

But before sleeping, I ensured that I uploaded the platter on my Instagram!!!  This is from Delhi Dharbar in Johannesburg. For all my vegetarian traveler friends, this might be useful if you are in Johannesburg or traveling there anytime. 

 

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BFmaelAx-do/?taken-by=m.pendown

 

 

 

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