I
Winter 1963

It was cold and dark when the taxi drove by a massive brick
building with cream-colored pillars and a majestic plaza and steps
in front of it. The snow lay in piles on the street corners, at the
curbs, and encircled the building. There was a hush, the kind that
only comes from a snow-covered winter night that dampens all
sound. Sampath Kumar couldn’t believe he had left behind the
warmth and convivial chaos of Bombay for this dispiriting
landscape that was drab and dead, even for a PhD in chemistry at
the University of Michigan.

“What is that building?” he asked the driver.

“Hill Auditorium,” the driver replied. “They get all kinds of
famous musicians like the New York Philharmonic or opera
singers, if you like that kind of stuff.”