In my "Life without Penny" series the four male principal characters in TBBT split up. Only Sheldon stays at Caltech, Leonard returns home to Princeton, Howard moves to the Kennedy Space Centre and Raj returns to his alma mater of Cambridge University. What happened to Raj? Part 8 - Samina again
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Two days later Raj met Samina in the Indian restaurant, she greeted him with a hug and a kiss.
"Welcome Raj, this is my favourite restaurant in Cambridge, let us sit down."
Samina kept talking as they sat down.
"I may prefer England to India but I love Indian restaurants, my parents ran a restaurant in London and I lived over the shop. I have done an exhaustive study of all the Indian restaurants in the Cambridge area and this is the best, trust me I used the scientific method in my study :-) I must eat here two or three times a month, I always bring relatives here to eat. My parents are back in India but I have some cousins in London who come up every now and then. Here's the waiter, hello Sunil, how is your wife, I hope that she is feeling better. This is Raj, he is here for the first time, I am sure he is in for a treat tonight. Just bring us some water to drink, I will order my usual chicken curry, let's give Raj a few minutes to look at all the wonderful dishes on your menu. Don't worry about getting a starter Raj, they always bring me some Naan bread that we can share…."
Five minutes later, whilst Samina had been talking non-stop, Raj raised his hand and Samina said "are you ready to order, here's Sunil with the water and Naan bread, I suppose I had better stop talking."
Raj then somewhat hesitantly spoke "Hello, I would like to try the seafood curry please."
"Good choice Raj, make sure there is enough rice for the two of us Sunil." Samina raised her glass of water "Here's to you Raj and your future."
Samina kept talking as Raj munched away on the bread.
"How are you enjoying Cambridge? I was happy to come back to come back to England to start my Ph.D, I left England when I was 13, my grandfather died and my parents took us all back to India to look after the family business. They were happy to return but I always missed England."
Raj finally spoke "What did you do for your Ph.D?"
"Iron oxides, some synthetic chemistry, structural characterisation and measurement of electrical and magnetic properties. I spent a lot of time doing X-ray powder diffraction and electron microscopy. That's what my new Ph.D students will be doing, hopefully I will spend a little bit of time with them in the lab. How about you Raj, what does an astrophysicist do?"
"I started my Ph.D looking at comets but now I look at Kuiper Belt Objects, Pluto like bodies."
"So should Pluto still be a planet?"
Raj smiled and said "That's a very good question, looks like the waiter is here."
"Oh good, thank you Sunil…."
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At the end of the meal Samina had a question for Raj.
"As you know I have just been appointed as a fellow of Darwin College, there is a formal dinner next Monday night for all the new fellows, we are allowed to bring guests…."
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Two days later Raj had another video chat with his parents
"Hello Mummy and Daddy, I had another date with Samina 2 days ago, we are going out again next Monday. I think she is growing on me….."
