Ante-Babel

By Robert Tomas

A young man who grows up in rural Connecticut exhibits talents in both Biology and Technology early in his High School years. Though he wants to stay close to his Dad when he goes to college, he decides to accept a full scholarship from an Ivy League school and moves away from home. His experience there is about obtaining the education he needs in BioTech, but also making the contacts to enable his entrepreneurial spirit. Then, his life begins to take a turn to developing a device that permits anyone to understand any language, truly emulating what the world would be like if the mythical tower of Babel had never happened and everyone was able to converse with anyone.
The plot thickens when he is linked to government factions, one hostile, the other friendly. With twists and turns throughout the story, the reader will not anticipate what is about to happen from chapter to chapter.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert Tomas
• Release date: Jan 12, 2016
• ISBN: 9781311977670

Robert Tomas

Born during the post WWII baby boom in New Haven, CT to parents of Polish descent, Robert followed the traditional lifestyle associated with the baby boomer. After finishing high school in Hamden, CT, he went on to earn a BA from UCONN. Since he married and starting having children while at UCONN, he dashed his dream of going to law school and instead embraced technology that was at that time limited to large companies. The PC had not yet been invented.... While working, he earned an MBA, and completed all of his work on a DBA (Doctor of Business Administration). He has to date worked for a number of technology companies and last worked to protect cyber security for major financial institutions worldwide. Robert is retired, since 2017.On his father's side, he is a second generation American and a third generation American on his mother's side. For his father's eightieth birthday he took him to visit relatives in a small town south of Krakow. What he encountered there was the inspiration for his first novel, My FatherLand. He has completed his second book, Ante-Babel and his third, A Tear in my Soul. He is working on his fourth novel expected to be released in 2021.

Book preview

Chapter One: Confusion

This was supposed to be a normal business trip, like the countless other business trips Jim had taken over his short, but busy, career. Fly into a city, rent a car, drive to your appointment, have your meeting, check into the hotel, spend a restless night in a strange bed, wake up, return the rental car, and fly home. Only twenty four to thirty six hours of discomfort. Jim had done this hundreds of times over the past years. Only, this time was different. This time, Jim didn’t check into his hotel. And he didn’t return in twenty four to thirty six hours. He didn’t return for two weeks.

The trip was supposed to be from Atlanta, Georgia airport to an address in Omaha, Nebraska. The address was known to him as a potential partner in a new venture in which he became involved. He remembered getting on the plane at Hartsfield-Jackson airport in Atlanta, being seated in a bulkhead seat and falling asleep shortly after the doors were closed. The next thing he saw when he woke up was his apartment in the Vinings section of Atlanta. He was lying in bed. He had a terrible headache and only had the memory of falling asleep on the plane. He went into the bathroom and looked in the mirror. He looked normal. Not overly tired or sick. It was 8am. Heddy wasn’t in bed or anywhere in his apartment. Maybe she left for class already.

He opened his laptop computer on his desk in his office, really a second bedroom in his apartment. Once it booted up, Jim couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The date was exactly 14 days after the last day he remembered. ‘How does someone lose 14 days and not have a clue where they’ve been or what they’ve done?’ thought Jim. He scrambled to get to his phone to call his business partner.

Billy, I just woke up and have no idea where I’ve been or what I’ve done for the past two weeks. Heddy’s not here. What the hell is going on?

Jim Wynalazca met Billy while an undergraduate student. Billy Seymour came from wealth. His father owned his own business and had homes on both coasts in the US as well as several homes abroad. Though Billy grew up wealthy, he always resented the fact that his Dad never had any time for him. It was the typical ‘Cats in the Cradle’ story from the song sung by Cat Stevens. This drove Billy to be distant, even now that his father’s time was no longer devoted to the business. His father sold his business while Billy was in Grad School in Georgia Technical Institute (called Georgia Tech by those who know the school). Even though his father reached out to him several times, Billy told him that he didn’t have time to meet or even to talk on the phone. He was gracious, but made it very clear that his time with his upstart business took precedence.

I don’t know why you don’t remember anything. You slam dunked the deal in Omaha and we now have the investment money we needed. You were just at my house with Heddy this past weekend celebrating with me. Are you saying you don’t even remember that?

I don’t remember anything after getting seated on the plane flying to Omaha and falling asleep. You mean I actually closed the deal??

You did Buddy. We have twenty-five million dollars in investment capital. We only needed twenty, but you talked our benefactor into giving us some wiggle room with an additional five. I don’t know how you did it.

Well that makes two of us Billy. I think I better go see my doctor. No one loses two weeks out of their life without something being wrong.

Jim, I’m telling you, you just saw me Saturday night, two days ago, and you were fine. Why don’t you take a long shower, get dressed and come into the office. Maybe you got drunk last night with Heddy or something. I’m sure you’re fine.

Alright. Maybe you’re right. I’ll be in after I shower.

Jim hung up the phone more confused than before. Was he having some sort of short term memory issue? He decided to call his Dad.

Dad, how are you?

Jim, so good to hear from you. Congratulations on your venture capital success! I am so proud of you. Twenty-five million dollars…WOW!! How in the world did you do it?

Obviously his Dad already knew about his meeting. He didn’t want to alarm his Dad by saying that he had no memory of anything over the last two weeks. So, he decided to ask some general questions. Well, I apparently said something right to get five mil more than we needed. I can’t remember if I told you all the details or just the end result.

Son, you only emailed me that you got twenty-five mil when you only needed twenty. Not really any details. Why, is something troubling you?

Emailed? So he never called his father? No, nothing wrong. You know how I like to go on and on about how I guided the conversation and ended up getting more than we need. Everything is great. How are you doing?

John felt as though Jim was holding something back, but didn’t want to push too hard. He knew Jim was under a lot of pressure and had gone through something very traumatic. So when can we get together for dinner? Whenever you have some time, it would be really nice if you could fly up so we can get together.

Dinner would be really nice, but now that we have the funding, I’m going to busier than ever for a bit. Let me give you a call back in a couple weeks. Maybe we can schedule something then. Love you Dad.

Love you too Jim. Take care of yourself. You sound tired. Talk to you in a couple weeks.

So Jim knew he’d talked with his partner, Billy. He even met with Billy just a couple days ago. He decided that maybe it would be best to see his family doctor get a quick check up. It couldn’t hurt and maybe some of his fears would be put to rest. He called the doctor’s office to get an appointment as soon as possible. Since his doctor was so popular, he wouldn’t be able to get in to see her until 2 weeks from now. For all he knew, he’d regain his memory by then. But, he might as well accept the appointment time, just in case.

His next call was to Heddy. She didn’t answer but immediately texted him that she was in class. He read and re-read the next part of the text to make sure he understood.

Thanks for the great night. You are amazing. You were still sleeping when I slipped out of bed for class. I’ll call you later after I’m done with classes for the day.

Jim hopped into the shower and took more time than he should have just relaxing in the hot water. He only decided to leave his steam cocoon when he noticed the skin on his fingers was starting to look water logged. After he dressed, he noticed it was almost noon, so he decided to stop at his favorite Asian restaurant on the way to the office. Rather than getting his car from the garage at his home, Jim decided to take a cab. First of all, driving in Atlanta could take 39 minutes or two and a half hours to reach the same destination, depending on traffic. Also, parking in Atlanta was pretty expensive. Since this was still rush hour and Jim didn’t like to ‘waste money’ on parking, he thought it much more logical to take a cab.

He liked this particular Asian restaurant because it was authentic. The owner and his wife immigrated to the US from China. They usually spoke to each other, and their staff, in some sort of Chinese dialect. Their speech patterns were very melodious, with voice inflections and nuances that he found fascinating.

He wasn’t really very hungry, but thought that he should get something in his stomach before starting work. No telling how long he’d be in the office tonight. Jim had a habit of forgetting to eat when he became highly involved in something that interested him.

As he arrived at the restaurant, he noticed that the inside was packed. But being such a good customer, the wait staff found him a table quickly. While Jim was looking at the menu, something seemed strange about it. The menu had each dish spelled out in some dialect of Chinese. The Chinese language is composed of multiple dialects. Dialects may not be the right term to use, as it does imply that one dialect will understand the other. In some cases, the two forms of Chinese being spoken may be totally unintelligible to one another. The main ‘dialects’ are Mandarin, Wu, Yue, and Min. But again, someone speaking Mandarin may not understand someone speaking Min. Jim felt lucky to live in the US and only have to learn to speak slower in the south and faster in the north, with a few variations in words like y’all or yuz guys. As Jim looked at the menu, he was able to read the Chinese names for each dish and even recognized that a couple dishes were written in Min, with most of them being written in Mandarin. Jim did not speak, none the less read, any dialect of Chinese.

When the waitress arrived, the wife/owner of the restaurant, welcomed Jim back then asked Jim in English what he’d like to order. He began speaking in Mandarin to order one dish he liked in particular with a side dish that was written in Min, which he spoke flawlessly in the Min dialect. The waitress beamed and answered back in Min that she didn’t know Jim spoke her native language. She explained that her husband only spoke Mandarin and refused to learn Min, so she hadn’t spoken in her native tongue for some time. Jim understood everything she said and answered in flawless Min that he would be happy to speak with her any time. She bowed to Jim and thanked him for learning her language.

Only problem was that Jim never learned any form of Chinese. He never even knew how to say thank you in Mandarin or Min or any other variation. Now Jim was not only confused, but he was totally freaked out by what just happened. He never studied any foreign language. Well, he tried to learn French when he was in High School, but that didn’t go very well. He eventually gave up on trying and determined that he better shore up his abilities in other areas, like math and science, to make himself more marketable when he started looking for a job. He excelled in anything with logic. Foreign languages seemed to have no logic, and he often wondered what the world would have been like had the unfortunate Tower of Babel incident never happened.

Jim only then realized that the owner (the man-husband to the waitress) was trying to talk with him. Jim realized that he was being asked how he learned Mandarin and Min. Jim didn’t want to raise any further questions or suspicions so he simply said, Oh, I’ve been studying it for years. I wasn’t comfortable speaking with you before, because I simply didn’t know if I spoke well enough. After saying this, Jim realized the owner had been speaking in Mandarin and he in turn had answered in Mandarin.

Well, you sound like you were born and raised in China speaking Mandarin. Your pronunciation and dialect are perfect. You should have told my wife sooner. Your meal is on the house today, said the owner in Mandarin. Jim thanked him and apologized for not revealing his secret sooner.

Freaked out was not sufficient to describe what Jim was feeling. He ate most of his meal, but was so upset he couldn’t even finish his lunch. He left without saying goodbye.

Chapter Two: Jim’s Youth

Jim grew up in a middle class family in a small university town in Connecticut. His home wasn’t far from the University. His father worked as a teacher at the local high school. His mother had died while birthing Jim. He didn’t learn that he was the ‘cause’ of his mother’s death until he was 18. His father didn’t want him to think that he was in any way responsible for his mother’s death, so he kept it quiet, always saying that she died shortly after he was born from an infection she got while in the hospital. Jim’s father, John, was a good man. He worked hard to support his son. He never dated anyone always saying that Jim’s mother was the love of his life and he just couldn’t see how he could dishonor her by being with anyone else. So his father was both his father and mother to him through his time at home.

Growing up in Storrs Connecticut, Jim was expected, mostly by his father, to attend the University of Connecticut. But Jim had other plans. Storrs was really just a bank, a grocery store, a post office, and a movie theater. And of course, the University of Connecticut (UCONN). It was nestled into the countryside with lots of green pastures and open space. UCONN started as an agricultural college and still had a rather strong agricultural college. But by the time Jim was 18, UCONN had a number of different colleges as part of it. Jim could have chosen any field of study he wished and attended UCONN receiving a well-respected Bachelor’s degree, Masters, or even a Doctorate.

John, being a teacher at E.O. Smith, the local High School, wanted desperately to keep Jim close. He wanted to know that he was safe. He wanted to know that he could check in with him every day. His father wasn’t overbearing, but worried that after telling Jim the truth about his mother’s death, he might react negatively. So Jim’s father went to the High School counselor, as one of his peers, and asked if he would steer Jim toward UCONN, as a personal favor. The counselor did not react well to the request. Instead he talked about the potential Jim had and how he could go to any Ivy League school he wanted. In fact, a number of Ivy League schools had already contacted the counselor asking about Jim. Though his father was disappointed in one respect, he was very proud that his son had attracted the attention of such prestigious schools. He found it strange though that Jim had not spoken with him about this.

That evening, Jim and his father sat at the dinner table, quietly eating their dinner. It’s not that they didn’t have a good relationship, or didn’t speak with each other often. But tonight, something was different. The air was heavy.

John finally broke the silence. How was school today?

OK, I guess. I heard that you visited my councilor.

I did. I wanted to talk with him about a couple of my students….and when you might be applying to UCONN. You know, early admission or the regular path.

Jim was a bit irritated that his father would do that, but knew that his Dad had his best interests in mind. Dad, about UCONN….we need to talk.

What’s on your mind Jim? I thought you really want to go to UCONN. I mean, it would be so much easier financially and you could live at home. Did something change?

Dad, I met with a recruiter from Yale. He said he was really impressed with my GPA, my community work, and my work in the labs at UCONN. I would still have to go through the application process, but he felt that I would be accepted and with a full scholarship.

Full scholarship to Yale? Are you serious? That’s really something!

I know you really wanted me to go to UCONN. But, this is an opportunity I shouldn’t pass.

Son, this IS an opportunity you can’t pass. Besides, New Haven is only an hour or two away. You can always come home for a weekend once in a while, or if you need something. John didn’t want to let on that he would miss him terribly. Jim was his life. Since his wife had passed, John let his world revolve around Jim.

You know I’ll be home often. I was accepted into their electrical engineering program. It’s a really good school and it will really help when I have to go out into the real world. I’ll really miss you Dad, but you can come down to New Haven whenever you want.

John choked back the tears. Oh, you’ll probably see more of me there than you have here. I’m getting pretty busy at school, and won’t have much spare time on my hands anymore. So this is a really good thing in the long run, lied John.

John got up quickly from the table and began to clear the dishes. Jim helped his father, as he usually did. Jim felt bad for his father, but knew that they shouldn’t discuss it anymore. It was only the middle of March and he wouldn’t be leaving until August.

As Jim finished out his final year at E.O. Smith High School, he began to get a bit more excited and a little less worried about his father. He took a couple trips down to Yale to walk the campus, register for classes and see where he would be living. Since the school was giving him a full scholarship, living on campus seemed to be the best financial decision, as having an apartment would cost money he need not pay.

Jim was interested in a variety subjects. He thought about Med School. He loved Electrical Engineering. He loved Bio-Technology. A pretty wide spread on his studies. He knew he had to stay with something logical, as he had no aptitude with illogic. All his life he tried to insert logic into his mind set. Not having his mother was the only thing that caused him to doubt that there was any logic to the world at all. He tried religion and found it unhelpful in explaining the rationale behind not having a mother growing up. It’s a mystery, just didn’t make it for Jim. So his approach to life itself had turned to logic as a guiding principle. The death of his mother was illogical and would remain so. He also pondered poverty and death of good people and small children. These things also fell into the ‘illogic bucket.’

Thus, Jim sought to learn as much as could about a variety of subjects, hoping that at some point he could understand the ways of the world and make sense of illogic. If only he could be smarter, he thought, he could understand all of it and apply his guiding principles of logic to it.

Though Jim had many friends, he always felt that they were superficial friends. He likened them to Facebook friends. Not someone you could confide in, but rather someone you could party with, or go to movie with. Though he dated often, he never truly connected with anyone he took out. The girls in his school thought him to be very cute, in a nerd sort of way. So he had no problem finding a date. It was just that he couldn’t ever feel the connection he needed to confide his feelings with his date. So he kept both girls and boys at an arm’s length. John was Jim’s closest friend, but even John couldn’t talk with Jim about Jim’s view of the world and how logic just evaded so much of what happened in the world. John avoided any conversation about Jim’s Mom.

Chapter Three: Back in Atlanta

Jim hailed a cab in front of the restaurant. Giving the address of his office to the cabbie, Jim decided to just relax and try to make sense of all this. The cabbie, being in the south yet clearly an immigrant, decided to be a bit talkative with his newly retrieved fare.

So where are you from? asked the cabbie.

Jim recognized an accent from Eastern Europe, but couldn’t quite place it. Oh, I grew up in Connecticut, but I’ve lived here for a few years already. Why, is it obvious I’m not a southerner?

The cabbie laughed, Yes it is obvious. I can understand you without any problem. Sometimes I need to ask my fares two or three times to tell me where they want to go.

Jim laughed in return as he understood exactly what the cabbie meant. So, where are you from? I recognize an eastern European accept but can’t narrow it down to a particular country.

I’m from Hungary. I was very fortunate to win the lottery in Hungary and get a visa to work in the US.

You mean you won the lottery?

The cabbie laughed. "Not the lottery like you have here in the US. No money was won. Each year, the US permits only a handful of Hungarians to immigrate to the US. To decide who will get