Before leaving for US in July 2011,i charged my Laptop to max power (Though it was 4 years old to sustain power max up to 1hr). I thought to use it in the long 19hr journey but i didn’t have to open it for long as there were some good movies in the flight. I reached Chicago at 12 pm and reached my school friend Sanket’s House in one hr. After being fresh and having some yummy home-made food prepared by Pragyan (Sanket’s better half) i thought to check my mail (Some one somewhere must be thinking about me and sent a mail). To my surprise my laptop cried as it was exhausted of power. Then i rushed to search for my charger and the moment I went to plug point, it was a surprise for me to see the pins were rectangle rather than round. I called Sanket “whats up man” he then explained me about the electricity source in US. The power source is DC (110V) in contradiction to AC (240V) in India.
I had to stay for 35 days so it was not possible to make some temporary arrangement for such a long period. To add to my problems my camera and cell phone also had reached the last bar of battery. I had to search for the adapter and it was a nightmare to search it in a new place. At last after a long search I found a RadioShack ( An electronic store).
At first a lady at the counter ( She must be more than 100kg) greeted me saying a loud Hello but she could not understand what I wanted and she went on saying OKHAY OKHAY…..I thought she can’t help me and went out. Still i thought why not to ask the other counter where the male sales person looked to be more helpful to the previous customer (Puchne mein Kya jata hai). After that the nearest counter was free and the little sensible man helped me to find an adapter. I spent 10$ but it didn’t help me to charge the laptop as it needed the power to be converted from DC 110 V (US) to AC 240V (India). I went around to get a power converter but in the area I stayed I could not find it,luckily i found a computer store which had a new charger for 65$. In fact if I would have known this before coming from India it would have cost me less than Rs100/.
When ever any one travelling to any other country try to know about the electricity source and carry the necessary converter.
Thanx Suman
